


Conventional Weapons

by FredAndGinger, SpinalBaby



Series: Danger Days [7]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Danger Days, Angst, Brainwashing, Graffiti, Hurt/Comfort, Javert is kind of a good guy?, Multi, Suicide Attempt, The Amis work with The Patron Minette, The boys (and girls) done fucked up again, Torture, combeferre has some issues, kill me now, kind of, post apocalyptic, radio shows, this is good i swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-22
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-16 13:08:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 37,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7269580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FredAndGinger/pseuds/FredAndGinger, https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpinalBaby/pseuds/SpinalBaby
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three years have passed since the events of Danger Days, and after a run in with some rebels, Enjolras is wary about letting Grantaire go out on any dangerous missions. However, Grantaire has other ideas and coaxes Enjolras into allowing him to go on a seemingly harmless scavenging job. The place has been abandoned for years, what could possibly go wrong?</p><p>The short answer: Everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Boy Division

**Author's Note:**

> Oh man, we did not think we were going to be writing this sequel when we ended Danger Days, but here we are! It's packed with all that was in the first fic and more, we hope you enjoy!
> 
> -FredAndGinger

Art Credit [Infinite-Mirrors](http://infinite-mirrors.tumblr.com/)

“Alright, Grantaire.” Combeferre said, filling the syringe with a clear liquid. If he pretended hard enough, Grantaire could almost convince himself that it was filled with water. “This might take a minute to kick in.” 

Grantaire nodded. His mouth was too dry to talk. He glanced over at Enjolras, whose grip had tightened on his hand. Enjolras looked almost as nervous as he felt. 

Combeferre took his free arm and stuck the needle in, depressing the plunger. It felt weird in his arm, but the normal kind of weird, the hospital kind of weird. Like there was suddenly a shot of ice water in his veins. Grantaire shivered. 

Combeferre turned to do the same thing to Enjolras. After that, they waited. Minutes ticked by, nothing happened. 

Slowly, Grantaire felt lightheaded. Maybe this would be a peaceful, slow transition? He kind of wanted to sit down, but he was afraid he’d worry his friends if he just suddenly went down on the floor. 

The room started spinning abruptly, violently. Grantaire looked around wildly, as though looking for an off switch, something to stop the world from moving. There was a hand in his, whose hand was it? What was going on? 

Grantaire watched as his life flashed before his eyes. Men in white coats and rebels in uniform black leather, both of them coming for him in the same breath. He saw his father glaring, Paint and blood dripping down stark white walls, both showing the same picture of the same person. He saw the fence in California, blocking them from the ocean. 

He saw his friends, their faces happy and sad all at once as everything happened simultaneously. Courfeyrac cheering at a concert while Joly screamed awake from a nightmare. Combeferre looking over notes, a serious look on his face, concentrating as Bossuet whispered something to Grantaire about paper flowers. Jehan talking over a radio about the weather while Musichetta held a crying Bahorel, Feuilly had just died. Eponine saying something bitchy to Cosette and Marius, who seemed to not hear, they were in a different time, whispering to each other gleefully. Gavroche running away, and Gavroche back again, a teenager. 

Grantaire turned and saw Enjolras. He’d never recognized the man as much as he did now. He saw him; screaming in the facility, kissing him in an alley in front of a painting. He saw him with a veil, trying in vain to get it out of his hair, saw him shooting down Ops, a crazed look in his eyes. He saw him in a feverish haze, saw him coughing until he couldn’t breathe properly. He saw Enjolras in those rare moments no one else was privy to, sitting close and quiet, peaceful in their room, in the city, in the car. 

It was too much. This was all too much for him to handle. He could hear a sound in the background and he wasn’t sure if it was coming from his own mouth or from Enjolras, whose hand had slipped from his grasp. He was on the floor now, how had he gotten there? 

Joly was above him, but Grantaire couldn’t see him clearly for all the memories. He was probably trying to say something. Joly liked to say things. Especially when stuff like this was happening. Grantaire tried to grasp onto this thought, to concentrate on his friend, but his brain offered him an out, blissful darkness. 

Grantaire thought he would be a fool to pass up such an offer. He sank into the darkness, grateful.


	2. Tomorrow's Money

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enjolras is being overprotective and Marius just wants some new tech. Featuring Courfeyrac as a responsible parent.

Three years had passed since the Amis had tried to go north to California. Since then, things had changed in the desert. The Operatives were slowly leaving the wastelands to go back to New Paris, making the desert much more wild. The Amis and the Patron Minette were thriving. 

Cosette, who had finally joined up to be a full time Ami, told them that the wastelands used to be like this when she was a child, unpoliced. It was a little concerning, legal citizens were at the mercy of criminals. Collectively, they were a little concerned. What exactly was going on in the city? 

They couldn’t be too concerned though, it was too much like being ungrateful for the present. With the Operatives mostly out of the picture, the Amis had effectively become the people the legal citizens came to when they were in trouble. People trusted them. Life was good. 

The Amis had also made a strange truce with the Patron Minette. Not that they’d ever really been fighting, but now it kind of felt like they were on the same side. It was strange. The Patron Minette also were in the middle of a falling out with the Thenardiers, after an argument about Azelma. Montparnasse had wanted to take her in as a member of the Patron Minette, but her parents were making too much money off of her, they forbid it. Montparnasse had been so pissed afterwards that he actually came over and talked to Marius about it. 

“I just wanted to do something nice.” He’d said, “Something for Eponine’s memory, you know? And they said that I just wanted to have sex with her. Which, no. Ew. No.” 

“I mean, you did have sex with Eponine.” Marius pointed out. 

“But I’m not going to replace her with her baby sister!” Montparnasse protested, “I have standards. Jesus, Marius.” 

This conversation had made Montparnasse believe that he was welcome at the Amis base all the time, without invitation. They couldn’t exactly turn him away, the alliance was too valuable. But it annoyed Enjolras to no end. 

“I just… why can’t he hang out at his own house?” Enjolras whined. “I don’t like him.”

“If he was at home, that’d mean he’s doing his job.” Grantaire commented, “And he doesn’t exactly seem to want to,” 

“I wonder what’s up with that.” Enjolras mused, “Usually he loves his job. And then he’s not here, terrorizing Ferre.” 

Montparnasse had taken to stalkerishly watching Combeferre in his lab and asking questions that required hours of explanation, which Montparnasse inevitably forgot by the next time he came to visit. Combeferre was getting tired of the constant science lessons. 

“Yeah.” Grantaire said, a little absently. “Hey, Apollo, I wanted to ask you something about the mission. The one that’s in a couple days.” 

Enjolras glanced at his husband. Nowadays he only ever called him Apollo if he was antagonizing him or he wanted something. From the way that he was nervously picking at a loose thread on his pants, Enjolras would bet actual money on the latter. 

“Yeah?” He asked.

“I want to go.” Grantaire said.

“No.” Enjolras said flatly, then he winced. He didn’t want to sound controlling, he just didn’t want Grantaire to do that. That sounded controlling. Enjolras sighed. 

“Why can’t I go?” Grantaire asked. This was new. He’d asked to go on dangerous missions before, but he never asked more than once. Or protested. 

“You know why.” Enjolras said, weary. 

Grantaire had almost died three years ago on their mission to California, and it was for _nothing_. Enjolras hadn’t allowed him on any missions since that had more than a mild chance of guns being fired. He’d almost lost him, so soon after he got him back. And now, now that they’d had so much more time, it only made things worse. Enjolras would do anything to keep him out of harm’s way. 

“That was three years ago, Enj.” The man protested, crossing his arms. “I’ve been _useless_ since then.” 

“You aren’t useless.” Enjolras argued, “You’ve been helping out, feeding the hungry, finding shelter for everyone who lost everything in the bombings.”

“I haven’t been on a mission in months.” Grantaire pointed out, “And trips to Thenardier’s don’t count.” 

Enjolras sighed again. He was right. This had gone on long enough, he had to get over himself. Grantaire would be fine, besides, this mission wasn’t even that dangerous. He still wanted to grab his husband by the shoulders and shake him, asking “WHY DO YOU WANT TO DIE?”, but he’d learned his lesson after the fiasco with Jehan and Courfeyrac all those years ago. He didn’t want Grantaire to feel useless. 

“Fine.” He said. 

Grantaire opened his mouth, as if ready to argue. He closed it. “Really?” 

Enjolras was angry that he sounded so gleeful, but most of that anger was directed at himself. He nodded. “Yep.” 

Grantaire launched at him in a hug. 

“Grantaire…” Enjolras sighed a little into the hug, “Just promise me you’ll be careful.” The blond closed his eyes for a moment, relaxing against his husband.

“You hypocrite.” Grantaire snorted, “I promise.” 

…

Grantaire walked into the room that housed the radio equipment the next day. It was just a normal hotel room, as this used to be a normal hotel, but it was now covered in wires. Enjolras was in the middle of a broadcast and Grantaire (and his nose) knew better than to interrupt. Besides, he didn’t have anything important to say, he just wanted to be with him. 

As he listened to the speech, he realized it was more propaganda against Operatives and the city. Enjolras didn’t like to call it propaganda, he said that it was all the truth, but Grantaire was pretty sure about eighty percent was opinion based, even if that opinion seemed to be right most of the time. 

They had been coming down hard with the radio broadcasts lately. After the bombings, the failed trip to California, and the wedding, they had become an integral part to the wastelands’ society. It was a little surreal. People looked up to them now more than ever, and they wanted them to distrust New Paris and the Ops, so here they were. 

Not that Grantaire minded this. He hated Operatives and everything they stood for. Hearing his husband rant about them was cathartic. 

“For every single person here in the desert, there are hundreds in the city.” Enjolras said into the microphone, “They vastly outnumber us. But they’re not the same as we are. They don’t think like us, they don’t _feel_ like us. Hell, I’m not entirely sure they feel anything.” He laughed a little, like it was a joke, “They’re afraid of us. They ran away, to the safety of the city, just to avoid all of us. We may be few in number, but we are powerful. We’ve proven that we can survive.” 

Grantaire bit back a comment about the Ops leaving the wastelands purely for economic reasons, at least as far as they could tell from Marius hacking into the Tomorrow Comes network. He actually liked the way his nose looked and would not like to have it broken again, thanks. 

“Tomorrow _will_ come. The future _is_ inevitable.” Enjolras assured his listeners, a play on the name of the dreaded company that controlled New Paris and its slogan. “But we will still be here tomorrow and we will get to shape that future. We are going to change this terrible, terrible world. Each one of you, everyone with even a spark of resistance out here in the desert, you are all carrying a new world on your backs, you’re all brilliant and strong. I believe we can change the future for the better.” 

Grantaire glanced over at Jehan, who was signalling for Enjolras to stop talking. He looked at his watch, it was almost three, Marius had wanted to talk to them about the mission they were going on tomorrow, and they only had a short window of time before Montparnasse showed up to stick his nose in everything. 

“This is Enjolras for the Amis, signing off.” Enjolras said. Jehan started to play some music and pulled off his headphones. 

“You ready to go get briefed?” Grantaire asked, grinning. 

“Yeah.” Enjolras said, before his face was shadowed with worry, “R, you don’t have to do this. It feels like we’re tempting fate or something.” 

“I don’t believe in fate.” Grantaire said, “And hey, if we get hurt we can just go get fixed up at the facility!” 

Grantaire probably earned the slap that he received, so he did not complain too loudly. 

…

“So what we need is more tech. What we have is outdated and it’s not going to last us much longer considering how fast Tomorrow Comes has been catching up on on their security.” Marius sat across from Musichetta, Enjolras, and Grantaire at a small folding card table he’d set up in his room. The rest of the room was littered with piles of technology and thick paperback books. Most of the books were on language and finance, but a few were guides on technology from the city itself. 

“What should we be looking for?” Musichetta asked, crossing her arms as she sat back a little. 

Marius got a look in his eye, sighing dreamily, “A laptop. What we really need is one of their laptops…” Marius let out a deep sigh immediately following. He shook his head, “No, you probably won’t find one. The Ops would never be stupid enough to just abandon one of their laptops at their base, but you will find these.” Marius dug through his pockets, producing a poorly drawn sketch of a wall sized computer. 

“Marius.” Grantaire raised a brow, looking at him as if he were insane, “There’s no way we can carry that back here.”

Enjolras snorted slightly, remaining quiet otherwise.

“No! You don’t need to bring me the _whole_ computer! I just need you guys to strip them for as many parts as you can salvage!” The awkward looking man pouted. “We really need better batteries, hard drives, fans, wires, and so on…” He looked away slightly, frowning a little more seriously, “The base has been abandoned for a couple years now but… you should still be careful. There was bound to be a lot of sensitive information in there at one time or another, so they probably still keep an eye on the building every once in a while.”

“Understood.” Enjolras nodded, and Musichetta gave Marius a knowing look. Grantaire frowned, he wanted to do this… but for some reason he had a feeling of deja vu, as if something similar had happened before that didn’t end well.

…

Enjolras lie next to Grantaire in bed, soft moonlight washing over the two of their forms, laying back to back. Enjolras was still mad at him from his comment about the facility earlier, but he seemed to have cooled down considerably. Grantaire rolled over, hugging Enjolras’ back to his chest.

“Enj, you still awake?”

“...No.” Enjolras sighed. Grantaire could feel his chest rise and fall with the dramatic breath.

“I’m sorry about earlier.” The brunette pouted a little, playing with the back of Enjolras’ blond curls.

Enjolras was quiet for a moment, before turning over to face Grantaire as well. “It’s okay. I just don’t want to think about the facility ever again… It was awful there… I can’t imagine what it was like for you there either. I don’t want to joke about it, I want to forget it. I never want to go back.”

“I know what you mean.” Grantaire pressed their foreheads together, closing his eyes, “I’d honestly rather die than ever go back there… Ever lose my memories again.”

“Yeah.” Enjolras took a moment before speaking again, “Grantaire, if it ever comes to that situation again… facility or death… let’s choose death.”

Grantaire nodded, “Of course. I’d never want to live without you.”

…

The next morning they were supposed to leave. Enjolras was giving Jehan some very specific instructions for his radio broadcast and the ginger was rolling his eyes, shooting a glance at Grantaire. The man shrugged, if Jehan hadn’t figured out a way to get Enjolras off his case after all these years, Grantaire certainly didn’t have the solution. 

He wandered away, looking for someone to bother to kill time. Gavroche was talking to Courfeyrac, crossing his arms and looking irritated. Grantaire huffed out a laugh as he overheard their conversation. 

“You have to learn stuff, Gav.” Courfeyrac was saying to the teen, “Or you’ll never be allowed to be an actual Ami.” 

“Why? Jehan only passed the fifth grade!” Gavroche argued. 

“Yeah, well Jehan’s mother didn’t love him.” 

“Neither does mine.” 

“I’m sure that Jehan would be very offended to hear that.” 

“Jehan is not my mother!” 

“Well he is now!” 

“Montparnasse wouldn’t make me do stupid science projects with Combeferre.” Gavroche argued. 

“Oh yes, Montparnasse would.” Cosette chimed in from nowhere. “I’d make him.” 

“You can’t make Montparnasse do anything.” Gavroche argued. Cosette snorted. 

“Oh, kid.” She said, “If me and Jehan teamed up, we’d have him on a leash if we wanted.” 

“You’re disgusting.” Gavroche said.

“Yeah.” Courfeyrac agreed, “But only in the best way.” 

Cosette beamed. 

It amused Grantaire to no end that Courfeyrac was trying to be a responsible parent. Sure it was the right thing to do, but watching the cheerful man try to be strict, and _succeeding_ for the most part… it was a thing of beauty. 

He tried to stay out of the arguments though, since he really saw both sides. Gavroche did not have the love of learning that Combeferre, Marius, and Cosette seemed to share, and the classes seemed like torture to him. But he did need to be able to do things, he needed to be able to troubleshoot on missions. Grantaire had to admit that even arbitrary science bullshit that Combeferre had told him about had come in handy at least once. Besides, whatever he was learning probably wasn’t that hard. 

It was strange to see Gavroche as a teenager. He was getting so tall… he’d probably outgrow Enjolras any day now, and the leader was not going to be happy about that. 

Grantaire turned away from the continued argument to go find someone else. Bahorel was already out on a mission, but he could probably bother Bossuet or Joly. 

It turned out that Bossuet and Joly were saying a long goodbye to Musichetta. She worried about them whenever she was gone, for good reason. Whenever she left it seemed that Bossuet got clumsier and tended to get hurt falling down stairs or something. It may have been partially Grantaire’s fault though. With all this extra time at the base, he tended to hang around Joly and Bossuet telling jokes, and the unlucky man had literally fallen for quite a few of them. 

Musichetta reached up and took Bossuet’s face in her hands, bringing him down for a kiss. She giggled and broke said kiss when Joly, who had been by her side, whispered something in her ear. Grantaire retreated. 

He ended up back by Enjolras, who was still talking to Jehan. He threw his arm over the blond’s shoulder, interrupting him. 

“You ready to go?” He asked, winking at Jehan, who shot him a grateful look. The ginger all but ran away. 

“I guess.” Enjolras said, checking his holster for his gun. It was a nervous habit he’d had ever since California. 

Enjolras had actually gotten a new gun in the last three years, after an Operative had shot his right out of his hand. It was bigger, with silver stripes, and it was the most powerful one the Amis had ever owned. Grantaire had seen him shoot through the side of a building with that gun, and it was terrifying. 

Musichetta came up, bringing Grantaire out of his thoughts. 

“You guys ready?” She asked. They nodded. 

They were taking the motorcycles to the old Operative base. They were faster and easier to hide than a car, and after an incident where Bahorel had driven right into a fucking boulder, Courfeyrac was not letting anyone drive his Baby 2.0. They only had two motorcycles though, so Enjolras and Grantaire had to share. 

Grantaire drove as Enjolras held on tight. They couldn’t speak over the noise, and Grantaire was kind of glad. He was actually kind of nervous for this mission, Enjolras’s anxiety infecting him. 

Ahead, Musichetta sped up. Grantaire went faster to join her, and sighed. This was going to be a long day.


	3. Ambulance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The chapter in which everything goes wrong.

They ditched the bikes about a quarter of a mile from the Operative’s abandoned base. The sun was high in the sky and the walk felt longer than it should have been. On the way, they had an interesting discussion. 

Grantaire wasn’t one hundred percent sure how they got on the topic-it was probably because Operatives were never far from their minds-but they started to talk about their opinions on Operatives. 

“The Operatives themselves aren’t bad people. They’ve been brainwashed into thinking they’re just doing their job. They are just regular city citizens otherwise.” Enjolras said. “Courfeyrac, Combeferre, and I were citizens too at one point. You too, Grantaire. In the city things were just different.”

“Wow, and that’s coming from the guy who shoots them for fun.” Grantaire snorted. Enjolras was about to argue that, but Musichetta cut him off.

“No, I see your point.” She said, “My dad was an Op and even though he did some pretty terrible shit, he must have been a good person at some point, right?” 

“Exactly.” Enjolras said.

“Yeah, _’at one point_ ’, They’re totally dead inside now, there’s no bringing them back.” Grantaire said.

“Well, we brought _you_ back. And now that Ferre has the resistance drug we can start working toward a cure. Something better than withdrawal.” Enjolras added.

Grantaire shook his head, “No, Ops are something else. I don’t know what they do to them, but I don’t think it’s just drugs and memory wipe. They turn evil.” 

“But we can help them.” Enjolras protested. 

“You’re the one who said that they aren’t like us anyways!” Grantaire pointed out, “You just said that you don’t think they even feel anything.” 

Enjolras shrugged, “Yeah, _now_. It’s not that they don’t have the potential to feel anything. What’s gotten into you? Usually you’re the one who wants everyone who’s been brainwashed to be saved.” 

“ _Citizens_. I care about the citizens, Enj. These guys… there’s no changing them. They’re doomed to be like this.”

“That’s a shitty thing to think.” Musichetta chimed in. 

“Yeah, well why don’t you spend five years in the facility and see how you like Ops?” He bit back. 

There was an awkward moment of silence. 

“I see your point.” Musichetta said at last. “Why don’t we talk about something else?” 

They talked about something else for a while, but they soon became too hot to waste their breath on meaningless conversation. Grantaire was almost willing to sacrifice safety and burst into the outpost just to be out of the heat. Almost. 

Musichetta picked the lock after she checked for alarms with some gadget Marius and Courfeyrac had made for this type of thing. Enjolras silently pushed Grantaire out of the way of the door, protecting him from potential enemies. The three of them were ready to run or fight, whatever they needed to do, as the door swung open. 

It was empty. Grantaire sighed, relieved and disappointed all at once. At least they could talk now. 

“Well.” He said, “This is fun. Getting back out there in the action.”

Musichetta rolled her eyes so hard Grantaire was a little afraid they’d fall out of her skull and led them into the room. “Shut up, Grantaire.” She said it with a teasing edge though, so he knew she still loved him.

“Hey.” Grantaire said, “You shouldn’t be telling me to shut up. Communication is key in dangerous situations like this.”

“Grantaire, shut up.” Enjolras growled, giving him a glare. He did not say it with a teasing edge. Grantaire chalked it up to him being mad he lost the argument about Operatives. Enjolras always was a sore loser.

“I think I’m funny.” Grantaire said, “And that’s all that matters.” 

No one replied. It didn’t matter, Grantaire still thought he was funny. 

They fanned out over the room, looking around. The room wasn’t that big, so it didn’t take long to look over, and there were no computers to be found. Marius said that the computers would be in the walls, but he didn’t say anything about them being hidden. 

“Maybe someone else got here first?” Musichetta suggested. 

“Maybe.” Enjolras conceded, “But we should check the walls just in case.” 

This led to the three of them feeling up the walls to the Operatives base for about twenty minutes, before Grantaire found a button. He pressed it. 

The walls started to move. Enjolras whipped around in shock to look at his husband while Musichetta stared in awe at the moving panels.

“Grantaire!” Enjolras scolded.

“What?” Grantaire asked, “We were supposed to find something!” 

“I think we’re out of luck.” Musichetta said, regaining their attention. The button seemed to have opened what used to be whatever stored the technology, but it was empty now, save for some ports to plug things in. 

Enjolras sighed in frustration. “Great, we’ve wasted the day. Let’s go.” He huffed. The two left the building before him, only a few feet ahead. Enjolras stopped to look back in the doorway glaring at the empty base before slamming the door shut, “What a fucking waste-”

Enjolras froze as the door shut with a loud bang, looking over at Musichetta and Grantaire, also frozen, his eyes wide. He fucked up. He could only hope that there were no Ops nearby no matter how unlikely it was. 

An alarm pierced the silence. They were frozen for another half second. 

“Run.” Musichetta whispered, like it was the only word she could remember. It was an excellent suggestion. They ran. 

As they were running the sound of the alarm grew fainter, but that only meant they could hear other things better. Like the car coming for them, a man talking over a megaphone.

“Stand still and wait to be contained.” The man said. The three Amis did not stand still, they ran faster. 

The car gained on them quickly, but the Operatives weren’t shooting. It was weird. They would think about that later when they had time for more complex thoughts. 

Musichetta turned, pulling out her gun and shooting at the window. She was the best shot of the Amis, and the Ops were getting out of their car so they could grab them without running them down. One went down, but it sparked a retaliation, and the Ops began to fire back. 

“Shit.” Musichetta said, turning and running off course as the Operatives started to head them off, “Shit. Fuck. Oh fuck.” 

“Oh fuck.” Grantaire agreed, running after her. After a moment, Grantaire noticed the lack of breathing from Enjolras. He turned to look behind him. 

It appeared that Enjolras had fallen, a swarm of Operatives were gaining on him. 

“Oh _fuck_!” He repeated, about to run back for him. 

Musichetta grabbed his arm. The Operatives seemed to have lost interest in the two of them as Enjolras fought. 

“We can’t go back for him!” She said, trying to pull Grantaire along. He tried to yank his arm back, to no avail. 

“We can’t _leave_ him!” Grantaire protested. 

“We’ll get captured too if we go back!” She had a point. Enjolras was losing the fight. Other Ops were coming towards them again. 

Suddenly, the conversation he had had with Enjolras came back to Grantaire full force. _“Grantaire, if it ever comes to that situation again… facility or death… let’s choose death.”_. 

“I’m going back.” He said firmly. 

Musichetta let go of his arm. “I can’t back you up.” 

“I know.” Grantaire said, and he ran off towards the Operatives, ducking between the few that had broken off the chase him and Musichetta. 

He was focused solely on Enjolras. The blond was looking around frantically, weighing his odds in this fight. The Ops would be on him in a second to take his gun. He raised it to his temple. 

Suddenly, Grantaire tackled him, sending the gun flying out of his hand. They were sprawled on the ground for about two whole seconds before Operatives were there to restrain them. 

Enjolras shouted at Grantaire as the Ops held him down, trying to handcuff the resistant blond, “Grantaire what the fuck! You had an out- why didn’t you take it? What the fuck did you do?!” Enjolras spat as an Op pulled him to his feet, “We fucking promised, Grantaire! What the fuck did you do?!” 

“I couldn’t let you _die_!” Grantaire shot back.

“You should have! Now we’re both going to end up back at the fucking facility!” Enjolras looked borderline murderous. An Operative hit Enjolras in the cheek with the side of his gun as they loaded the two of them into the back of the car. 

“Keep it down, citizen.” The Operative said emotionlessly.

“Excuse me! I will fucking keep it down when I want to fucking keep it down! I am trying to have a conversation with this fucking dumbass! I can’t believe you Grantaire!” 

The Operative didn’t try to shut him up again, looking a little taken aback. He only sat in between the two of them in the back seat. The Operative that held Grantaire sat on the other far side. 

“I think you can believe me.” Grantaire retorted. When he saw the look Enjolras gave him, he decided that maybe it wasn’t the best time for his jokes, but they were the only thing distracting him from the extent of his decision. He was glad Enjolras wasn’t sitting next to him, the man would have been able to feel him shaking. 

“You’ve fucking killed us both, Grantaire.” Enjolras said coldly, voice quieter. With that he turned away from Grantaire, looking out the window as the Op in between them shifted awkwardly.

“We’d have died either way.” Grantaire said, but it was in vain, as Enjolras didn’t respond.

They arrived at the holding facility less than an hour later, at least according to the watch the Operative was wearing. They both were checked in, had photos taken, and were sent to separate cells. 

Grantaire was unsure if the separate cells were a blessing or a curse. He could hear his husband pacing in the other room, his boots were not quiet. If he held his breath and listened hard, he could hear him muttering in the next cell. It was kind of comforting, until he remembered that the muttering was directed at him.

The next morning they were taken to the facility. Enjolras still wasn’t speaking to him and it filled Grantaire with dread. What if this was their last chance to say something to each other and all he had to remember Enjolras by was stony silence? But he didn’t want to piss off the man even further, so he kept his mouth shut.

They were carted through processing. Grantaire had been through this two other times now, so it was nothing new. A humiliating shower, your clothes being confiscated, the stupid uniform, and some light questioning. 

They weren’t given numbers this time, which was odd. Grantaire figured that maybe he got to keep his old number, and maybe Enjolras had been given a number before too. Maybe that’s what was going on. 

Their hair wasn’t shaved off either. It was strange, generally that was the first to go due to the hygienics policy. It had been three years though, maybe they were going to give them shots to make their hair fall out or something. It sounds like something they’d do. 

Stranger still, they were taken to an office and sat down in a chair next to each other, seated before a desk heaped with paperwork. Grantaire shot a confused glance at Enjolras who seemed to forget his anger under the circumstance. The Operatives handcuffed them to their chairs and left the room. 

Javert walked in a moment later. They recognized him, Grantaire from seeing him in the flesh as he was being shown off as an experiment, and Enjolras from the TV in New Paris. He sat down behind the stacks of paperwork and glared at them. 

“I’m going to be frank with you.” The man said, “You’ve put yourselves in a very bad position and there is no way for me to get you out.” 

Grantaire was confused. Why would Javert ever want to get them out? He hated criminals. He glanced at Enjolras, but the man was too focused on Javert. 

“However, I am going to offer you an unprecedented arrangement.” The man continued, “As thanks for your help in the reconstruction after the necessary bombings three years ago.” 

“Our help?” Enjolras asked, looking angry. Javert help up a hand and the blond fell into resentful silence. 

“Your help.” He repeated, “It was greatly appreciated and I’d like to offer a reward.” 

“What’s the reward?” Grantaire asked before Enjolras could interrupt again. It obviously wasn’t their freedom, but he couldn’t imagine what it could be. 

“You will have full custody over yourselves in the facility.” Javert said, “You, Julien, had no one signing your consent forms during your last stay, and you did not have a caseworker assigned to sign things. This is unlawful. You, Paris, had your father signing all consent forms until you were taken as a ward of the state, and a caseworker took over.”

Grantaire made a noise of protest in the back of his throat on hearing the name he’d been given at birth in the city, a name he hadn’t used in years. He told it to Enjolras, once, and he didn’t live it down for months. But Javert was still talking. 

“What I’m offering you means that they couldn’t do anything life-altering to you without your consent. All testing is allowed, as it’s safety assured, but things such as execution and memory loss will have to be discussed with me and you will have to sign a paper to allow it to occur.” Javert explained. 

“We get to keep our memories?” Grantaire asked, a little in awe.

“As long as you want them.” Javert said, “And if you are declared to not be in a fit state of mind to make your decisions, I’ve given you custody over each other so that you can make decisions for the other.” 

“Like, the same rights my father had over me?” Grantaire asked. Javert shook his head. 

“Your father had full rights over you. This will only be a partial thing. Because you are married.” Javert said. 

“Legally?” Enjolras asked, raising an eyebrow. 

“Congratulations.” Javert deadpanned. “I’ll give you five minutes alone to say goodbye, and then you’ll be escorted to your cells.” 

Javert left the room. 

“So.” Grantaire said, “What’s our chances to escape in the next five minutes?” 

“We don’t have any chance…” Enjolras sighed, looking down.

“Well.” Grantaire said, “Musichetta got back safe at least.” 

“We can’t talk about them here, Grantaire.” He looked over at the brunette, with a somber expression, “We have to keep them safe.”

“Yeah.” Grantaire agreed. He’d forgotten, the walls have ears. Musichetta was honestly probably safe to mention, as her records as a legal citizen in the wastelands was probably botched at best. 

There was a moment of silence. 

“If they… if they don’t get us…” Grantaire started, then stopped. He wasn’t sure where he was going with that. 

“Yeah.” Enjolras agreed. 

“I’m sorry.” Grantaire said.

Enjolras said nothing, looking back down. 

“I love you.” Grantaire said after another silence. He reached out his hand, the handcuff was just long enough that he could just brush Enjolras’s arm with his fingertips. 

“I love you too.” Enjolras said quietly, “But I’m not going to forgive you for this.”

Grantaire swallowed hard. The words hit him in the chest, sinking his heart. Well, at least they were better last words than “you’ve killed us”. 

“Yeah.” He said after a while. They spent the remainder of the time in silence, until an Operative came in to escort him away, leaving Enjolras behind. He glanced back at him once more, before he lost sight of the man.


	4. Gun

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A familiar face shows up at the facility and Enjolras has a difficult time coping with his capture.

Enjolras was escorted to his cell, where he waited for what felt like an eternity for something to happen. The room was not much to look at, white walls, white bed, and a white toilet. Just like last time. 

After time had passed, the door opened. An Operative walked in, followed by a familiar woman. 

“You.” Enjolras said, his voice low. The woman- he recognized her as the nurse that had been assisting Cubac on the day they broke Grantaire out of the facility. He’d have killed her on the spot if not for Combeferre.

“Me.” The nurse repeated back in a chipper tone.

“The nurse.” Enjolras recalled.

“Actually, it’s doctor now. Doctor Manon. I never thought I’d see your face again Mr. Enjolras. I’m actually quite pleased I get to see you again. I had some things I wanted to test…”

“You’re disgusting.” Enjolras spat, getting up from his bed. “Let us go.”

The nurse made a noise of amusement, “Sure.”

Enjolras blinked. “Really?” He asked, sounding unsure yet hopeful.

“No.” She snorted. “Don’t make a fool out of yourself. Testing begins tomorrow, but first I had a question for you.”

“Like I’d answer you.” Enjolras growled, clenching his fists.

“It’s a personal curiosity really. What were those metal loops you each had in your belongings?”

Enjolras felt a slight pang in his chest, “Fuck you.”

The nurse looked slightly surprised at his reaction, “Fine. But I will find out.”

And with that, she swept out of the room. The Operative handed Enjolras a cup of pills. They were the dietary supplement pills. The Operative left, not thinking he needed observation for this. Enjolras threw the cup across the room, bright blue pills scattering across the floor. 

He sat down on his bed, burying his head in his arms. He wished he had his gun. If he had it with him none of this would have happened. But he’d dropped it. At least if he’d kept his grip on it when Grantaire had tackled him they could have had a chance at fighting off the Operatives. But he didn’t. 

Enjolras spent the afternoon fantasizing about the escape they could have made if only he’d had his gun on him. The cold metal object was his only comfort after California, and now it was gone, lost in the wastelands. He fell asleep and dreamed that their friends had helped them escape- that they’d made it back to the base and everything was okay. When he opened his eyes only to see the bland white walls of the facility instead of the vibrant pink ones of his room, he felt crushed. And then angry.

…

The next day, testing began. Well, it was _called_ testing, it was really just straight up torture to try to get Enjolras to tell them information. 

They had him hooked up to a machine, reliving the worst moments of his life. The technology had changed, he noticed. It was no longer abstract, terrible images, but he was reliving real events. He saw Bahorel come back without Feuilly, waiting for R in the city only to have him never arrive, the bombings, the last time he was here, thinking he was dying. 

Doctor Manon came in after a while and began to question him. His mind was distorted, but he knew enough not to tell her anything. It’s not like there was much he could have told her that would be much use anyways, besides the location of their new base. It was kind of a lost cause on her part. 

After a few hours he was escorted back to his room to wait for the next day of testing to arrive. Back in his room once again Enjolras curled up on his bed. It wasn’t very comfortable, but it wasn’t the floor. He closed his eyes, feeling sick. He could only wonder what Grantaire was going through right now… Grantaire…

Enjolras dwelled on his husband’s name for a while before remembering it was Grantaire’s fault they were here. All of it. Everything was his fault. From the minute he begged to go on this mission to the time when he’d wrestled Enjolras to the ground, everything- all of this was _his_ fault. If he hadn’t done that- then he wouldn’t have had to go through any of the pain he was facing right now. As far as Enjolras cared, it was self-inflicted.

The blond curled into himself, wrapping his arms around his torso as he stewed in his anger. When he got to see Grantaire again- if he got to see Grantaire again he would give him a piece of his mind.

…

The next day was more of the same, as well as the day after that. After a week, Enjolras lost track of days. He was there for what seemed to be an eternity, and he hadn’t seen Grantaire once. He wondered if the man was dead. Whenever he thought of that, he covered his worry with more anger at the man, building it up so that he didn’t need to think about it. 

…

Doctor Manon had been thinking about the weird metal loops for the two weeks the rebels had been at the facility. They became kind of like worry stones, she’d turn them over in her hands while she thought in her office, contemplating them. 

She didn’t like Enjolras. He was going to be fun to torment. She did kind of like Grantaire though. Where Enjolras was amusing on accident, Grantaire seemed to be cracking sarcastic jokes. He was great, and she loved her sessions with him, though they weren’t very productive. 

To think, she hadn’t thought she’d ever see them again. Of course she knew about the trap laid out for rebels, they needed new technology and were known to strip places bare in search of it. But she never imagined she’d get two _famous_ rebels. And the one who tried to kill her, too! It was like her birthday came early. 

“Doctor?” A voice asked, interrupting her thoughts. She glanced over to see a man holding out some papers. “The paperwork you requested.”

“Thank you.” She said, taking it and dismissing him with a wave of her hand. She’d thought to look at the pictures taken in the holding facility. She scanned the pages, looking for the metal loops.

At first glance she couldn’t find them. Until she looked at their profiles on the left side…

“Is that…?” She asked out loud, glancing at the real bands, “Are those wedding rings?” She laughed, looking at them in a new light, “I mean, I knew they were gay, but… really?” 

She laughed again, delighted. This was going to be fun. 

…

The next day, she came into the testing chamber where Enjolras was being questioned by an Operative. She dismissed the Op, before turning to him with a big smile, holding up the ring.

“So, I see you rebels have been having fun in the wastelands. Playing pretend.” She said, “Little make-believe weddings?”

Enjolras stood up when he’d seen the ring, his eyes narrowing. The minute she’d opened her mouth Enjolras had been consumed with rage. His fist flew. Unfortunately in his blind fury he’d only clipped her cheek before the Op that had been outside the door rushed back in to restrain him.

“You bitch,” He breathed, the Op now having a firm grip on his arms. “Get your filthy fucking hands off of that.”

Manon just laughed. “Oh, how cute.” She touched his nose lightly, “You’re adorable. A little homosexual wedding out in the desert. Was there cake?”

Enjolras jerked back his elbow into the Operative’s stomach, giving him a moment of freedom to snatch back the ring, spitting in Manon’s face. The Operative grunted, quickly gaining control of the man, but unable to pry the ring from his grip. He glared at the doctor.

She giggled, “Let him keep it.” She said, turning to leave, “Testing will continue for another hour, try to get something out of him this time.”

Enjolras felt his stomach drop. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to handle another hour, they’d already had him in for a little over the usual amount of time today. He was now sure that was because Manon had been too busy with the rings to come in to end testing on time. 

He was strapped to the table once more, as visions were paraded through his mind and electrical shocks through his body. He groaned in pain. The Operative was asking him questions, but exhaustion was taking over, making the man before him hazy. This was new. 

The doors burst open and he looked to the side to see Grantaire, being led by an Operative. Doctor Manon fluttered in after him, after Grantaire had had a moment to stare at Enjolras writing in pain. 

“Oh, I’m so sorry.” She said, not sounding sorry at all, “I forgot to tell you. Enjolras hasn’t been very cooperative, so we’re giving him some time to make it up with extra credit.” 

“Enjolras.” Grantaire said, stunned. He shook out of his shock, trying to make his way to the blond. The Operative stopped him, and he struggled, his eyes focused entirely on the man before him. 

“Oh, do you miss him?” Manon asked, “Your little boyfriend?” 

“Husband, actually.” Grantaire corrected sharply. He struggled harder, but this Operative obviously knew how to hold a prisoner better than the one who held Enjolras, and he did not let go. 

“Husband.” She laughed, “Oh, that will never get old.”

“You said he was fine!” Grantaire accused, turning to Manon, “You said that he was just in solitary, that he was going to be reconditioned!” 

“You believed her?” Enjolras asked from the table. The visions and shocks had stopped when Grantaire entered, though he wasn’t entirely sure he hadn’t passed out and this wasn’t some strange dream. “You knew this was going to happen to us.” 

“Ooh, a lover’s spat?” Manon asked, using a babying voice, “And to think, he just fought so hard for that ring!” 

Grantaire looked back at Enjolras, who tried to hide his hand to no avail. 

“How…?” Grantaire asked, “How’d you get that?” 

“He elbowed a guard, for one.” Manon said. “And he spat in my face.” 

“Please just shut up.” Enjolras groaned. Manon laughed again.

The doctor sighed a self-satisfied sigh. “Alright. That’s enough fun for the day. Mr. Enjolras, you can go back to your cell. It’s our little artist’s turn now.” 

Grantaire was saying something, but Enjolras wasn’t sure what. He couldn’t hear him over the rushing blood in his ears as the Operative stood him up and he was guided to his cell on shaky legs. 

He didn’t even make it to the bed, sinking to the floor and clutching the hand holding his ring. He twisted it, having missed the familiarity of it on his finger.

“Grantaire.” Enjolras whispered, putting his head in his hands.


	5. The World Is Ugly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Manon knows that Enjolras won't crack under pressure, but she has other goals and other plans in mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are sorry for not updating. We just kept forgetting, we're posting two chapters tonight to make up for it and going back to the regular schedule the day after tomorrow.
> 
> Sorry to keep you waiting.

Grantaire wasn’t able to walk to his cell that day. Doctor Manon had decided to test out some drugs on him that were supposed to lower his resistance to the contentment medication, but actually ended up just draining his will to live.

An Operative mostly carried him to his cell and deposited him halfway on the bed, before leaving. Grantaire slid slowly from the edge of the bed to the floor, unable to will himself to even try to stay up. The floor was stable, and that’s all he needed right now. 

He looked up at the ceiling. It was moving. Ceilings weren’t supposed to move. He frowned at it. It didn’t stop moving. He laid there frowning at the ceiling for a long time. Or, it felt like a long time. He wasn’t exactly sure. Time was moving oddly. Just like the ceiling. 

Eventually, the door to his cell opened. Grantaire mustered up the strength to move his head and glance at the door. There was an Operative seemingly arguing with Enjolras. It was hard to make out, the two of them were moving a lot more than the ceiling was. The Op pushed Enjolras down into the room and shut the door. Enjolras started banging on the doors and yelling. 

Until that moment, Grantaire didn’t realize that he had a splitting headache. Enjolras’s   
pounding on the door and screaming brought the pain back to the forefront of his mind. Grantaire weighed his options. Was moving to cradle his head worth it? 

Yes, he decided. Yes it was worth it. He moved his arms, whimpering in pain as he went, to try to comfort himself. His arms blocked some of the noise, but then all of it abruptly stopped. Grantaire thought it was kind of rude. He’d just gone through all this trouble to block out the noise. He glanced up at the blond to see why he’d stopped. 

The man was staring at him, as though he had never seen him before. Grantaire supposed it was fair, he looked kind of pitiful all balled up on the floor. But it’s not like he hadn’t been pitiful this whole time. Grantaire wished that he could see Enjolras’s face more clearly, as it was rather hard to focus with the room spinning and hazy like this. Maybe his expression had changed. He would be utterly unprepared to deal with whatever change. He hid his face once more. Enjolras was probably still mad. He wanted to be lucid for that, he deserved to be lucid for that. 

He couldn’t convey this to the blond though. His voice didn’t want to work and he was unsure of how to say it anyways. In the end, it was Enjolras who spoke first.

Enjolras dropped to his knees in front of Grantaire, reaching out to him, “Oh my god, Grantaire- are you alright?!” Enjolras lowered his voice when he saw Grantaire flinch, “Grantaire…”

Grantaire looked up, Enjolras was holding his arm lightly, as if he was afraid of hurting him. He frowned, he thought Enjolras was still mad. What was going on. He tried to get his vocal cords under control, to ask why Enjolras was being so nice, but they failed him and all that came out was another whimpering noise. 

“Grantaire,” Enjolras pressed his lips to Grantaire’s forehead, something wet dripping onto his skin. Enjolras was crying, “Grantaire, I promise we’re going to make it out of here, okay?”

It took Grantaire a moment to register what Enjolras had said. When he did he let out a small laugh of disbelief.

“They’re only human Grantaire, they’ll see what they’re doing is wrong. They just don’t think-”

“They’re evil.” Grantaire mumbled. Enjolras’ words echoed in his head. _They don’t think like us, they don’t feel like us._ In his brain the words sounded like the staticky radio transmission they’d came from. “There’s so many of them…”

“They’re afraid. They’re weak.” Enjolras rested his forehead against Grantaire’s trying to reassure him of something, though Grantaire was unsure of what. “Things will be better in the morning. Rest.”

“The future is inevitable.” Grantaire echoed the words of Enjolras’ own speech weakly. His vision was a little better now. Less blurry. He could see the blond frowning at him.

“That’s true.” Enjolras said, “But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to get there. Even if nothing changes… we can still hold out hope that we’ll get out of here.”

Grantaire snorted, “Hope?” 

“Hope.” 

“How?”

Enjolras looked down at his husband. His eyes had started to clear, he was becoming more lucid, but that only meant that having a conversation would be harder, they’d argue. But Grantaire said that word with such desperation packed into one syllable. The blond swallowed hard. 

“Come on. You got us here, Grantaire.” He said in the least accusing tone he could muster, “We’ve got to get through it.” 

“It was a mistake.” Grantaire said, and Enjolras’s heart dropped. In that instant, understood what Grantaire had done in stopping him. He couldn’t imagine going home without him, being here without him, any of it. 

“It _was_ a mistake.” Enjolras agreed, because agreeing was easier than explaining that he was wrong, “But I’m not mad anymore.” 

The words were true, but Enjolras couldn’t bring himself to forgive Grantaire, not yet. He didn’t know how long they’d be here together and the uncertainty scared him. Absolving Grantaire felt too much like goodbye. If he held onto that anger, Grantaire couldn’t die. He couldn’t die because Enjolras hadn’t forgiven him. 

The blond knew that his logic was deeply flawed, but he was too focused on Grantaire, who was slowly reaching to lace their fingers together, to dwell on it. 

“You’re the only good thing in this whole fucked up place.” Grantaire said. “I don’t… I don’t know what I’d do if you weren’t here.” The thought overwhelmed him. His heart began to race in panic. Distantly, he remembered Manon saying something to him about the drug she gave him, about how it might cause increased heart rates and racing thoughts. 

“Grantaire.” Enjolras said, seeing that Grantaire was breathing harder, trying not to succumb to a panic attack. Enjolras needed to get his attention back. “It wouldn’t matter if I’m gone. Because they can take you from the desert, they can take your freedom, and they can take me, but there’s one thing that they can’t take away from you.” 

“My devilish good looks?” Grantaire asked through gasps. He wasn’t sure if the noise Enjolras made after that was in amusement or irritation. 

“No, Grantaire. They can’t take away your memories. They can’t take you away. And you’re the only thing here that really matters.” Enjolras said. Grantaire shook his head in protest, but Enjolras just shushed him, petting his hair. “We’ll be okay.” 

“Are you sure?” Grantaire asked once he’d calmed down. 

“No.” Enjolras said at length. “But it’s a nice thought.” 

… 

Enjolras had thought that he would be taken from Grantaire’s cell after that. In reality, the only change that was made was that another bed was added to the cell. Enjolras was confused. They’d gotten their point across, Manon was trying to torment him with the knowledge that his husband was in so much pain. But why was she letting them continue to stay in the same cell. 

His question was answered over the next two weeks. He was slowly brought in less and less for questioning as it became apparent that he wasn’t going to tell them anything. That meant that they kept Grantaire for longer amounts of time and returned him in worse condition.

It was worse, in a way, than any of the physical torture had been. He would be unharmed all day, left alone with an empty feeling in his chest as he wondered if Grantaire would be alive when they brought him back (he knew the man would have to sign away his own life for that, but sometimes he thought that Grantaire _would_ if they offered). He knew that if he had been more forthcoming with information they would still take him to the room for his turn, and for that period of time Grantaire would be spared. 

Enjolras wasn’t sure if whatever they were doing to Grantaire was working or not. The man would often come back in a not-quite-lucid state, where Enjolras was sure he’d been affected by the contentment drugs, but it would wear off quickly. Whatever they had figured out did not last long. 

He did his best to comfort Grantaire when he came back from the testing room. He was afraid it wasn’t enough, though. Grantaire tried to tell him that he was doing everything he could in the situation, there was nothing else they could do but wait, but Enjolras felt helpless every time the Operatives shoved his husband back into the cell. In the moments before Grantaire was lucid, Enjolras would wonder if he preferred that Grantaire was alive, or if he wished the man would just die during testing one day, just so that it all stopped. He tried not to think about it too hard. 

…

One night, Enjolras was holding Grantaire on a tiny twin bed, trying his hardest to fall asleep, when the man stirred in his arms. 

“Grantaire?” He asked, moving so he could look at his husband’s face. His face was contorted in pain, even asleep. “Grantaire! Wake up!” 

Grantaire started to thrash around, and Enjolras backed up, afraid of being hit. They’d been through this a lot in the desert, both of them, but this hadn’t happened here yet. They were both too exhausted to dream.

Grantaire woke himself up a moment later after painfully hitting an arm against the metal frame of the bed. He winced and Enjolras crawled back towards him, cradling his head in his lap. 

“Apollo.” He said, looking up in recognition. He reached up his hand and Enjolras took it, lacing their fingers together, “I thought I was never going to see you again.” 

“What?” Enjolras asked, frowning down at him as though he didn’t have that same fear every day, “I’m right here.” 

“Enj.” Grantaire said, desperation in his voice. “I love you.” 

Enjolras frowned. There was something in Grantaire’s tone, some sort of need for Enjolras to understand him. He wasn’t sure what Grantaire wanted him to understand. “I love you too.” 

“And you’ve got to tell our friends, when they come get you.” Grantaire continued, “Tell them that this isn’t their fault. Especially Musichetta. They blame themselves for stuff too much.”

“R…” Enjolras trailed off, slight warning in his voice. They weren’t supposed to talk about their friends here, they’d gone over this.

“And Marius.” Grantaire added, paying no attention to the warning. “It’s not his fault this happened.” 

“Shh…” Enjolras said, in his most comforting tone, “What’s this about?” 

“I’m dying.” Grantaire said faintly.

“You’re not dying!” Enjolras said, trying to force a laugh even though his heart was racing painfully. “You’ll be fine! They’ll come get us and you’ll be fine, R.” 

“I must be.” Grantaire said, “I feel like I am.” 

“You can’t!” Enjolras whispered fiercely, desperation lacing his voice. He was fighting back tears and he was grateful that Grantaire probably couldn’t see his face in the darkness. “You can’t leave me here alone, Grantaire.” 

“I don’t want to.” Grantaire said quietly.

“Then stop talking about it. You can’t die, that’s ‘life-altering’, like Javert said. You can’t die unless they ask to kill you.” Enjolras wanted this conversation to end, but Grantaire was already shaking his head, ready to argue. 

“They asked once.” Grantaire admitted. This was news to the blond, they’d never offered to kill him. All Manon had ever offered to Enjolras was to wipe their memories, which he’d refused. “If they ask again I’m not sure…” 

“You’re not leaving me here.” Enjolras said as firmly as he could without letting his voice crack. “Promise me.” 

“I…”

“Promise!” 

There was a moment of silence. All Enjolras could hear was his own ragged breathing as he tried to hold back tears. 

“I promise.” Grantaire said eventually. Enjolras drew in a deep breath that sounded more like a sob, leaning down to hug his husband. 

“Thank you.” He whispered, and Grantaire nodded into his shoulder, as if unable to speak. 

After a few more quiet moments, Grantaire spoke. 

“I’m sorry.” He said into Enjolras’s shoulder. The blond could barely hear it. Grantaire had stopped apologizing after two days locked in the same room together.

A plan was forming in Enjolras’s mind, a terrible plan. But it would make sure that Grantaire would never feel like this again. 

“It’s okay.” He replied, “I forgive you.”

Grantaire started to cry and Enjolras knew that it was going to be a long night. 

…

The next day, when Grantaire was gone for testing, Enjolras looked up at the camera directly. He’d been ignoring it for so long, it was weird to acknowledge it. 

“Manon.” He said with as much command as he could muster, “I’m ready to discuss terms with you.”

There was no reply. He was pretty sure she was laughing at him, so he was kind of grateful. A few minutes later, two Operatives came into the room to escort him to her office. 

Enjolras had never been in her office. It was covered in awards and commendations. The Operatives forced him into a chair across from a desk, but didn’t handcuff him. He took this as a good sign. 

Manon turned around dramatically in her swivel chair. It reminded Enjolras of when Courfeyrac used to do that when they were teenagers in the city. He was more amused than scared because of the gesture, maybe he’d gotten over her posturing. 

“Julien.” She crooned, “You wanted to talk to me? What seems to be the matter, my little patient?”

Enjolras weighed the odds for him killing her right there. He wasn’t handcuffed, but the Operatives were closer to him than he was to her. Better not chance it. 

“It’s about the deal you offered me.” He said, crossing his arms. At the movement one of the Operatives tightened their hold on their gun. “Is it still on the table?” 

She seemed to think about it for a moment. “Do you mean the deal where we try our new medicine on your little boyfriend and wipe his memory? You’d get yours wiped too, you know.” 

“Husband.” He corrected, ignoring the way she cooed. “And I know.” 

“Are you sure?” She asked, “We can look at him to see…” She offered, turning and picking up a remote to a TV he hadn’t noticed. She clicked a button and suddenly Grantaire was there, and he was watching what they were doing to him. 

“Please.” Grantaire was begging, “Please stop.” 

“We need to check again for accurate results.” The nurse on the screen was saying, “Please rate your experience at the end.” 

With that, she jabbed him with a needle. Grantaire started convulsing on the table. Manon turned off the TV. 

“You really want to make him forget _all that_? But memory is so precious, Julien.” She said, smiling at him. Enjolras was disgusted with her. 

“Yes.” He said. She laughed at him and turned towards a file cabinet to find what she was looking for. 

“It’s the first time I’ve used one of these on a rebel.” She said, “And I don’t even know the little artist’s real last name!” 

She put the paper on the table, filling it out in silence. After a moment she looked up at him. 

“I need you to state your legal name.” She said. 

“Julien Enjolras.” He replied. She filled it in. 

“And Paris’s legal name.” 

“Paris Rene.” Enjolras said. She looked up at him in mild confusion. 

“Doesn’t he have a last name?” She asked. Rene was his middle name, she knew. 

“No.”

“It’s not Enjolras?” She teased. 

“No.” He replied flatly, trying desperately to not remember Grantaire’s teasing about the subject on their wedding night. He didn’t want her to taint his happy memories.

“Things must work differently in the desert.” She sighed, filling it in, “People do lose their last names here often enough. He’ll just be assigned a new one.” 

Enjolras watched her fill out the rest of the paper in silence, before she slid it over to him. 

“Just sign on the X.” 

He picked up a pen and looked at the paper. He remembered vaguely one of the life lessons his father had taught him before he left the city, to always read papers before you signed them. There was too much pressure here though, and his guilt over what he was about to do was too consuming. He barely skimmed the page, before signing his name. 

“Excellent.” Manon said, grinning. “The procedure will begin in half an hour. My Operatives will take you to say your goodbyes.”


	6. The Light Behind Your Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enjolras made a deal and now he and Grantaire must face the consequences.

The Operatives led Enjolras to the room where Grantaire was being tested on. They told the nurse testing him to leave the room, and they left as well, leaving Enjolras alone to face his fate. He took a deep breath, looking at his husband, who didn’t seem to notice his presence. He knew they didn’t have much time together, but he couldn’t bring himself to go to him quite yet. 

He leaned against the wall and shut his eyes, taking a breath to calm himself. How was he supposed to tell Grantaire what he’d done? He wished that his friends were here to help him. They would know what to do, they would know what to _say_.

He could almost see them now. He wanted to remember them happy, but all he could think of was them judging him for every decision that got them here. Not properly scoping out the building, how he triggered the alarm, his unsuccessful suicide attempt, how he could have spared Grantaire at least a little… all the way to this final bad decision. 

He knew he was wrong. No matter what Javert had said about them being allowed to make decisions for each other, this was not his choice to make. Grantaire was going to hate him. 

He knew that Joly, Bossuet, and Musichetta would be furious. They were all more of Grantaire’s friends than his, having his same sense of terrible humor. He’d hope that Musichetta could see eye to eye on this one, on a logic level at least. She seemed to understand him better that way, a contrast to the sheer principles on which Bossuet and Joly acted. Bossuet would be mad he hurt his friend, in any capacity. Joly didn’t believe in taking away someone’s right to choice, no matter the circumstance. They’d had this debate before, regarding other things, but these things carried over. 

Bahorel was always on his side, ever since Feuilly died. He acted like the big brother Enjolras had never really wanted, threatening to beat people up for him and valuing his word above all others. At least Enjolras could count on him for this. He knew, he knew that Enjolras would do anything to keep Grantaire safe. 

He wasn’t quite sure what Marius’s reaction might be, but he’d be upset. Not even the productive kind of upset. This was a trait that did not endear him to Enjolras, but he could cry at the thought of it. He was getting too sentimental. Cosette would be incensed. She hated the facility more than words could say and any compliance with them felt like a surrender. 

Jehan would be mad. He wouldn’t want to speak to Enjolras after this, not that he’d ever have the chance. And he would tell Gavroche not to talk to him. This would mean that Gavroche would go out of his way to interact with Enjolras, but again, he would never have the chance. None of this really mattered. Enjolras shook his head. He should be talking to Grantaire, not thinking about this. 

He knew he was leaving his two closest friends out. He didn’t want to make them mad. He didn’t want to think of them mad. He couldn’t bear it, he couldn’t bear to think that they’d be upset with him when all was said and done. 

_”You must understand.”_ Enjolras reasoned in his mind, having a theoretical conversation with them, _”You need to know… I wouldn’t do this. But I can’t let him suffer like this. He’d rather die, but I can’t let him die.”_

In his mind he could imagine Combeferre reasoning that Grantaire had done the same thing, in not letting him kill himself. Enjolras cursed his hypocrisy. He took another deep breath and tried to collect his thoughts. Oh, if he could only have one last real conversation with all of them. He’d be able to tell them everything he ever wanted. Now all they had to remember him by were suicide notes he’d never meant for them to find three years ago. He cringed at the memory. 

“Alright.” He whispered to himself, “I can’t not tell him. He deserves to know what’s coming.” 

And with that, he pushed himself off the wall and approached Grantaire. He put his hand on the man’s shoulders. Grantaire’s eyes shot open and he inhaled sharply, before focusing on Enjolras in front of him and calming. Confusion settled over his face. 

“R.” Enjolras said, “I made a deal with them.” 

“What are you talking about, Apollo?” Grantaire asked, groaning a little as he tried to sit up. Enjolras hurried to help him, adjusting the table so they could look at each other. He sat by Grantaire’s legs and tried to think of how to phrase what he was going to say. 

“I… You’re in so much pain, Grantaire. I can’t take it.” He shook his head, “I just… it’s all my fault that we’re here and I want it to stop.” 

“What did you do?” Grantaire asked, frowning, “Enj?” 

“I signed papers. We’re going to be reinstated in the city as citizens.” Enjolras said, his voice barely a whisper. 

“They’re letting rebels be citizens?” Grantaire asked after a moment of silence, “We’ll just break out.”

“No.” Said Enjolras, lowering his eyes. “They’re going to… they’re going to make us forget everything, R.”

There was a long pause. Enjolras looked up at Grantaire. It looked like something might have broken inside his brain. 

“I’m going to forget again?” Grantaire asked faintly. 

Enjolras nodded miserably. 

“I can’t!” He cried, struggling to move, to get to Enjolras. He wanted to shake some sense into his husband. “I can’t forget again, Enj! You can’t let them do this!” 

“I’m sorry.” Enjolras whispered. 

“Go back!” Grantaire demanded, “Tell them to unsign it!” 

“I can’t.” 

“You told me that they could never take this away, you bastard!” 

“I lied.”

“Take it back! Go find Manon and take it back, Julien!” 

“I can’t.” Grantaire looked at his husband, who was looking away, trying to understand why he was only getting such short answers. The blonde was crying, silently. 

“You can! Just get up and do it! I can’t lose everything again, I can’t lose you, I can’t…” Grantaire slowly broke down, sobbing at the end of his rant. Enjolras’s arms shot out to hold him, provide some comfort. Grantaire accepted it, their time was limited, there was no time for grudges. 

“How long do we have?” Grantaire asked after a moment. Enjolras looked at the clock. He had no idea. 

“A few minutes.” He said, it was probably true. “R, we’ve got to get it together when they come in. We can’t let them see us like this.” 

Grantaire looked up at Enjolras. He hadn’t stopped crying either. “I’m trying.” He said softly. 

“Me too.” Enjolras said.

“I wish we had more time.” Grantaire said, cursing the facility internally for giving them so little. 

“I wish we had one more night.” Enjolras said, “I could tell you all the things I should have said.”

“You could tell me now.”

“If you promise to stop crying.” Enjolras said in what he hoped was a teasing voice. Grantaire opened his mouth to argue the hypocrisy, but closed it again. 

“I promise.” 

“I’d tell you that you’re probably the best person I’ve ever met in my entire life.” Enjolras began after a moment of thought, “I could live forever alone with you and never get bored. You’re kind, but you do half the nice stuff you do behind people’s backs. Your art is probably the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen in my life, and when we were kids I used to fantasize about having an apartment with you, if the city was something it’s not. I wanted to be with you forever.” 

“I wanted to be with you forever too.” Grantaire said. This was not helping his tears, “I said I would. Till death do us part.” 

“Well… this is a little bit like death, isn’t it?” Enjolras reasoned. 

“Yeah.” Grantaire agreed. “I guess it is.” 

“I’d tell you I love you.” Enjolras continued, “I’d tell you that so many times…” 

“I love you.” Grantaire interrupted.

“And I’d tell you that you were right a lot of the time when we were arguing, but I didn’t want to admit it.” 

Grantaire let out a watery laugh and Enjolras smiled. 

“I’d tell you that you were right, and I never want either of us to have to live without the other. The pact was stupid.” 

“I agree.” Grantaire said. There was a moment of silence while Enjolras tried to think of what else to say, but Grantaire interrupted his thoughts, “I wish they’d killed us both.” 

“Grantaire…” Enjolras trailed off. He agreed with the sentiment, but he didn’t want Grantaire going into this new life with suicidal thoughts. It didn’t seem right. “Grantaire, when I’m gone you have to be strong, okay? You have to do this for me.” 

“I can’t.” Grantaire whispered desperately, “I can’t do this without you. You’re the only thing that’s ever kept me going.” 

Enjolras wanted to say more, but the door opened and he knew they’d run out of time. He took Grantaire’s face in his hands and quickly kissed him. 

“I love you.” He said, as an Operative pried them apart.

“I love you too.” 

“Isn’t this cute?” Manon asked, smiling at them, “That whole thing, so touching.” 

“Fuck you.” Enjolras said. Manon just laughed. 

“Alright. It’s time for you to get your memories erased!” She sang, “Isn’t this exciting? I’m so happy. I’ve never gotten to do this so extensively before!” 

Enjolras wasn’t sure how happy he was to hear she’d never done this before. Maybe it meant she would overlook something. Or maybe it meant she’d leave one of them as a drooling mess with the mental capacity of a baby. 

“Hmm…” She hummed, looking between them, “How will we pick who goes first? Maybe a game? That could be fun.” 

An Operative leaned over and said something to her, too quiet for Enjolras to hear. She looked back at them and clapped her hands. 

“Alright! We don’t have much time, Javert is going to be here in a few moments and I’m afraid he won’t be very happy with any of us. So I’ll just decide the order.” She looked between them again, like a child in a candy store who was only allowed one thing, “Paris. You have more experience, so you’ll be going first.” 

Enjolras expected Manon to have him leave the room for this. They’d never been around to watch each other’s procedures, except for on camera. But Manon seemed to have different plans. 

She ordered the Operatives to strap Grantaire to a chair, and to hold onto Enjolras as she slowly approached Grantaire with the needle. 

“Now Paris, this is going to hurt. Please alert me if the pain goes past number ten on the pain chart, because then I’ll have to ask someone to record the camera feed so I can watch it again later.” Before he could respond, she put the syringe in his arm and depressed the plunger. 

Grantaire looked at Enjolras, fear clear in his eyes. The effects took hold, and he started screaming, thrashing in his chair for one long minute before he became still, staring ahead. Enjolras could almost see the memories leaving him, as he slowly became more blank.

“No.” He said, before beginning to fight the Operatives. He knew this was going to happen, why was he so upset? He was the one who did this. “No! Grantaire! Look at me! R!” 

Grantaire did look at him, but in confusion. He frowned. “Who are you?” 

Enjolras wanted to say something, but all the air was knocked from his lungs be the force of the Ops shoving him into a chair. “Grantaire…” He said with his remaining breath. 

Manon approached him and stuck him with the needle. Enjolras was grateful for the lack of cruel commentary. His world exploded in pain, and he remembered nothing.


	7. Kiss The Ring

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Musichetta comes back to the base and tells everyone about how the mission went wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are terrible, forgetful people.

Musichetta ditched her motorcycle outside the base, running in full speed. She ran to the lounge, but only Joly and Bossuet were there. 

“Chetta!” They cried in almost unison, coming towards her with open arms. She shook her head, trying to catch her breath. 

“Combeferre.” She said as soon as she could talk, “I need Combeferre. I need everyone.” 

Bossuet and Joly exchanged a concerned look, but took off in different directions, going to track everyone down. Musichetta headed outside, she was pretty sure she’d seen Courfeyrac by the garage and he needed to hear this too. 

She found both Courfeyrac and Jehan, having a heated discussion about something while Courfeyrac was halfway in a car, replacing the steering wheel. 

“Oh hey, Musichetta!” Jehan said once they noticed her. Courfeyrac leaned out of the car to wave. “How’d the mission go?” 

“I uh… I need to talk to you guys in the lounge with everyone. Everyone’s here, right? No one went on any missions?” She asked. Jehan and Courfeyrac looked at her, and then each other, in confusion. 

“No…? Everyone’s here.” Courfeyrac said, “What’s going on?”

“The mission didn’t go so well.” Musichetta responded evasively, before turning to head back to the base. Jehan and Courfeyrac trailed behind.

“Enjolras is probably going to talk to us about how everything got fucked up.” Courfeyrac said to Jehan. Musichetta frowned, wanting to correct them, but only wanting to go over everything once. 

They got to the lounge. Joly and Bossuet were there with everyone else, all of them looking rather confused. Courfeyrac and Jehan joined the group of people staring at Musichetta. 

“Where’s Enjolras?” Bahorel asked, “And Grantaire?” 

“Probably in the facility by now.” Musichetta said, before taking a deep breath, “They got captured by Operatives.” 

“What happened?” Marius asked, “The base was abandoned!” 

“I think it was a trap. Enjolras triggered some kind of alarm and we got overwhelmed. Enjolras was going to kill himself and me and Grantaire were going to get away, but Grantaire stopped him, so they both got caught.” She summarized, “How do we get them back?” 

Everyone turned to Combeferre. He was the second in command, it had been laid out for a long time. He frowned.

“I don’t know.” He said, “We… we’ll have to make a plan. Um. Maybe we should talk to Montparnasse?” 

Everyone agreed that they should go see the Patron Minette, since they were the ones with funds and supplies at the moment. Marius went to go see if he could find anything in the Tomorrow Comes database about their friends’ whereabouts, and everyone dispersed to do different tasks. 

“Me and Jehan can go.” Courfeyrac said once he and Combeferre were alone in the room, “We’ll leave as soon as he’s done with the radio report.” 

“Yeah.” Combeferre said, his voice hollow. “Did you hear what she said? About Enjolras trying to kill himself?” 

Courfeyrac nodded, frowning. “She… she must have seen it wrong. I’m sure Grantaire just went back because he didn’t want Enjolras to go to the facility alone. He was using the buddy system.” 

Combeferre bit out a laugh. “Yeah. The buddy system. We’ll have to talk to them about that when we get them back.” 

“Yeah.” Courfeyrac agreed. “Well, I’d better leave you to your planning. We need a good one this time, they’ve got more security now.” 

Combeferre sighed. He hoped Montparnasse would be helpful, because he was really their only hope. He had no idea how to get them out of this. 

…

Montparnasse was not being helpful. 

“Come on, you need to help us!” Jehan whined. 

“I don’t _need_ to do anything. Those two got themselves into this.” Montparnasse said casually, drinking vodka from a cracked teacup. Courfeyrac wanted to comment on him drinking so early in the day, but he refrained. 

“I know you don’t _need_ to.” Jehan sighed, “We aren’t asking you to help us for free. We’d be willing to trade.”

“What do you even have to trade?” Montparnasse asked. Courfeyrac wondered the same thing. They’d lost a motorcycle in the failed mission, and he’d only recently gotten enough supplies for a third car. Maybe Jehan knew about something they had that was non-mechanical to trade with. 

“Services.” Jehan replied, crossing his arms. 

“Services.” Montparnasse deadpanned back, raising an eyebrow. “I thought we agreed that that was off the table, Jean. Or did you forget?” 

“Not that kind!” Jehan shot back, seeming offended at the implications, “I meant that we could work for you, in exchange for your help. You always need new employees, Parnasse.” 

Montparnasse seemed to think this over. Courfeyrac wanted to give his boyfriend a look, but held himself back. It’d be a bad idea to let this man know that Jehan hadn’t informed anyone ( _not even his own boyfriend_ ) of his plan. 

“You’re right.” Montparnasse said at last, “I do need people. But for this to work, all of you will have to be fully employed by the Patron Minette. This won’t be like when you lived with me before, Jehan. No one will be exempt from anything.” 

“Not even Joly?” Courfeyrac asked. He couldn’t imagine their doctor running off with his cane to assassinate people. 

“Joly… maybe. But we’ll find something for him to do.” The man said, waving a hand like it didn’t matter, “Everyone fit to work will be working, is that better?” 

“Yeah.” Courfeyrac allowed. He didn’t like this at all, but if this was the best they could do, they’d have to work with it. 

“Bring everyone here tomorrow at noon.” Montparnasse instructed, “Initiation starts then.” 

He waved them out airily, as though their presence bothered him. Jehan and Courfeyrac were going to leave, but Montparnasse called after them. 

“Wait! I just remembered!” Courfeyrac and Jehan turned to look at him. Some of his cool facade had slipped, “Don’t bring Gavroche.”

Courfeyrac didn’t want to know what was so bad that they couldn’t bring the kid, but he was glad that Montparnasse was protecting him. They nodded and left. 

“Well, his attitude’s changed drastically since yesterday.” Courfeyrac commented. It was true, the day before, the man had been at their base annoying the hell out of Enjolras for shits and giggles, and now he was pretending to be this imposing figure. 

“He _is_ a dangerous person.” Jehan commented. “Remember when we first met? You were so scared of him!” 

“I was not!” Courfeyrac said, indignant, “I was afraid of whoever was in the stories they told about him, because it certainly wasn’t _Montparnasse_ they were talking about. People stretched the truth.” 

“The stories are probably true.” Jehan replied, gazing at the road, “He’s calmed over the past few years, but when I first met him, and _before_ I met him… He was terrifying.” 

Courfeyrac frowned. The stories he’d heard were horrible, there was no way one man could have done everything it was said that he did. Especially not Montparnasse, he seemed more like a cartoon, like a mascot for his own creation. He couldn’t be as dangerous as they said, could he?

“So,” He said, deciding to change the subject, “What’s the initiation going to be?” 

Jehan shrugged, “I never got initiated. I didn’t want to be a part of his work.” 

Courfeyrac nodded. That made sense, considering Montparnasse was the reason his mom died. He decided to change the subject again, and they spent the rest of the ride talking about a book of poems Jehan had gotten from Thenardiers’. Courfeyrac usually didn’t like talking about them, since he didn’t really get it, but today it was kind of calming to have something normal to talk about. 

…

The next day, all of the Amis headed out to the Patron Minette’s strip club. They’d left Gavroche behind to guard the base. The kid was pissed, but once he heard that it was on Montparnasse’s orders he sulked instead of fighting it. The man was a bad influence. 

Gueulemer and Babet had herded them into the living area, where the group was abuzz with murmurs until Montparnasse entered, holding out his hands for them to fall silent. 

“I’m sure that you all know you’re here to become part of the Patron Minette.” Montparnasse began. Courfeyrac could almost hear a sarcastic comment Grantaire would have made if he was there. It honestly made him kind of sad. 

“I know that you all want to help, but I’m not sure you know what you’re getting into.” Montparnasse continued, “Marius, Cosette, Jehan, and Eponine were never full members of the Patron Minette and they didn’t know the extent of our actions. I am not willing to sign all of you on as half members, like they were. For this to work, you’ve got to be fully committed to this group, and to be fully committed to this, you have to know what we do.”

Montparnasse nodded his head at the door, where there was a little window. Courfeyrac had a bad feeling about what was about to happen. The door swung open and Claquesous came in, dragging a young woman with him. She was unsteady on her feet, swaying like there was a strong wind in the still room. Courfeyrac’s breath caught in his throat. 

Claquesous forced her to her knees in front of Montparnasse, who drew his laser gun. Courfeyrac looked around. Someone had to stop this. They couldn’t let what was about to happen happen. Someone else had to be on his side for this, right? 

The person who looked upset was Bossuet, and he was on the other side of the room. Even Joly and Musichetta looked emotionless, like they didn’t care about this girl. Courfeyrac glanced at Jehan, Combeferre, Marius, they all had the same determined look. 

Courfeyrac swallowed and tried to set his face the same way they’d set theirs. Montparnasse pulled the trigger without a word. The woman’s head exploded, blood and gooey matter went everywhere, but mostly onto Courfeyrac, who had been standing the closest. 

“Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to get blood on your glasses. I should have turned the setting down.” Montparnasse said casually. Courfeyrac had forgotten that he still had his bright pink shutter shades on. 

There was a moment of silence. 

“Was that supposed to shock us?” Combeferre said, taking off his glasses and wiping off the blood. Courfeyrac wanted to do the same, but he wasn’t sure if he could deal with seeing all of this in full view. One of the shutters was blocking out the majority of the body. 

“It was meant to warn you.” Montparnasse replied. “If you boys don’t do _what_ I order you to, _when_ I order you to, we’ll have some problems.” He pointed to the body, “This woman didn’t pay us. It was her fourth chance. We are generous, but not forgiving, and I expect you to follow this rule. No extra chances, not even to people you know.”

At this, he cast a glance at Jehan, before looking back at the group as a whole. “Think it over, you have until sunset to decide if this is what you really want to do.” 

With that, Montparnasse swept from the room. Courfeyrac turned to Jehan, to make some comment, but his boyfriend was spacing out, staring at the dead body with something close to horror in his eyes. 

“Jehan?” Courfeyrac asked. Jehan looked up at him slowly. “Are you alright?” 

“I think I need to lie down.” Jehan said after a moment. Courfeyrac opened his mouth, to offer to go with him, “Alone.”

Courfeyrac turned to go talk to Combeferre, but the man was caught up in a discussion with Bahorel. He desperately wanted to talk about _what the fuck was going on_ but he didn’t want to interrupt. Bahorel probably had something important to say, where Courfeyrac’s internal thoughts were basically one long scream.

He decided that the next best option was to leave for some fresh air. He went outside. Babet gave him a weird look that he’d think about later, but no one stopped him and no one followed. 

The outside world still looked the same, despite the gory mess inside. It was almost as though nothing happened, like the girl’s death was insignificant and no one would care or miss her. Courfeyrac shakily took off his shades, wiping the gore off on his bloody t-shirt. Enjolras would have been infuriated. 

At the thought, Courfeyrac threw up. When he was done retching, he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see Montparnasse. 

“Yeah, that was pretty gross, huh?” The man asked, conversationally, “I really have got to make Babet fix that setting. Blood grosses me out too.” 

“Yeah.” Courfeyrac agreed. He wasn’t really grossed out by blood, he was more grossed out by casual murder in front of all his friends with no consequences. But they needed Montparnasse’s help to get Enjolras and Grantaire back, so he’d suck it up.

“It’ll get better.” Montparnasse said, “That’s probably going to be the worst you’ll see, anyways. I wanted you to know what you were getting into, but… not quite like that.” 

Courfeyrac nodded. He couldn’t think of a response. Montparnasse clapped him on the shoulder again. 

“Well, I’d better get back. There’s some mouthwash in the bathroom if you need it.” He said. When he was gone, Courfeyrac sat down. 

“Well.” He said to himself, “Things can’t get worse than this.” 

…

Things got worse. 

The Amis had to sign a three month contract. They were given the tamest jobs the Patron Minette had to offer, despite Montparnasse’s display. They were basically made to be glorified debt collectors, going to see people on their first, second, or third strikes. Montparnasse and the rest of the original Patron Minette were the only ones sent out on fourth strikes. Montparnasse claimed that it was because he wanted the job done right, but Courfeyrac knew that he had a soft spot for them. 

Jehan got a bit better after a few days. He confirmed Courfeyrac’s suspicions that he’d freaked out after basically reliving his mother’s death, but he assured his boyfriend that he was fine now. Courfeyrac wasn’t entirely convinced. 

They had all gotten new uniforms. It was basically a suit with a leather jacket and a plain, black mask. Courfeyrac and Jehan kind of died inside at the lack of color, but Montparnasse insisted that it was to keep them anonymous. 

Over the month, Courfeyrac realized that, while everyone was morally opposed to what the Patron Minette was doing, no one was as upset as he was. He knew that Combeferre had a morally gray area when it came to protecting Enjolras, but he didn’t think the man would forsake all of his morals for this. And he knew Jehan didn’t like what the Patron Minette did at all, why was he doing this without the slightest remorse? 

Courfeyrac didn’t want to ask anyone and start a fight, so he started talking to Bossuet more, since he knew the man felt the same way. He realized that he hadn’t talked to Bossuet (or Joly and Musichetta) that much over the past few months. They felt the same way he did though, all of them. Musichetta and Joly were just better at hiding it. So he came to them whenever he needed someone who understood him. 

He and Jehan had just gotten back from talking to someone on their second strike. Jehan went to do a radio broadcast (they had decided to continue with updates, despite not having a full time show anymore, unless Gavroche decided he wanted to play music from the Amis base) and the ginger came running out. 

“You’ve got to get everyone, fast!” He said, and ran back into the room. Courfeyrac turned and ran off to find everyone. It took less than two minutes. Soon, everyone was crammed into the Patron Minette’s media room. 

There was a small TV there, which was always on the Tomorrow Comes testing channel, just in case something happened. Today, there was a newscaster there, talking about the weather.

“They were talking about Enjolras and Grantaire.” Jehan said, so that no one would ask what was going on. 

_”And we return to the breaking news from South Sector B. Tomorrow Comes Operatives captured two very important terrorists and they are going to say a few words before their punishment later today.”_

“Punishment?” Joly asked. Everyone shushed him. 

The scene on the television changed from the newscaster at his desk to a white wall. Enjolras walked up, and sat in front of the camera. He was in the gray facility t-shirt and had a dead look in his eyes.

_”Citizens and noncitizens of the wastelands.”_ Enjolras said. His voice was void of emotion or inflection. _”I’ve come to tell you that you should return to the city. New Paris is the closest place to paradise you’ll find in this desert, and you’re fooling yourselves if you think you’re free. Tomorrow Comes will be putting a new program into motion; every legal citizen in the desert will be relocated into the city within the next five years. So why not join us now?”_

There was a pause, as though someone was moving cards or Enjolras was waiting for a teleprompter. The room was dead silent. 

_”And for all of the rebels: your crimes will be forgiven if you turn yourselves in. Find the Patron Minette and ask to talk to Javert. He will make sure that you’re given new lives in New Paris. If you do not comply with this, you will be eradicated with everyone else left in the desert. It has been too wild and uncontrolled for too long. It has to stop.”_

There was another pause. Courfeyrac thought he heard Cosette gasp when Enjolras mentioned that their crimes would be forgiven, but he might have imagined it. 

_”After all, the future is inevitable. Why try to stop it?” _Enjolras asked. The feed cut out and the screen was blank for a moment, before it went back to the newscaster.__

___”There is an additional message from the artist known as R. We’ll turn to that now.” ____ _

____The screen cut back silently to a painting on a white wall. Courfeyrac imagined that it was the same wall Enjolras had sat in front of moments before, but there was no way to tell. The painting was monochromatic, the same painting Courfeyrac had seen over and over in different renditions. Enjolras with his fist in the air._ _ _ _

____This time though, Enjolras did not look determined, or angry, or righteous, like the expressions Courfeyrac had seen before. This time he looked defeated. Gone was the red jacket and the golden halo of curls, replaced by the facility uniform and flat, white hair. The image was signed “82473”._ _ _ _

____The screen changed back to the newscaster._ _ _ _

_____”The terrorists will be executed tonight at 7pm, near sunset. And now, back to your normal programming.”_ _ _ _ _

____The screen turned to static. The room was silent. Courfeyrac looked to Combeferre and their eyes locked. He could practically feel his friend’s rage._ _ _ _

____“Well, that was fun.” Montparnasse said, “Good to know that all this was useless.”_ _ _ _

____He left the room before any of the Amis could kill him, but it was a close thing._ _ _ _

____“We need to get them out _now_.” Combeferre said, “Marius, I need you to locate where they’re being held.” _ _ _ _

____“This might be a trap.” Musichetta said. “They’ll be planning on us doing something impulsive.”_ _ _ _

____“We don’t have a choice!” Combeferre shouted, “We can’t let him die!”_ _ _ _

____A silence rang in the air for a moment after Combeferre’s words._ _ _ _

____“Them.” Bossuet corrected eventually. “Can’t let _them_ die.” _ _ _ _

____“That’s what I said.” Combeferre defended, but he seemed to come a little more to his senses after that. “I’ll go… find Bahorel.”_ _ _ _

____Courfeyrac glanced around. He hadn’t noticed that the man was missing. Combeferre stalked out and everyone branched off, trying to think of things to do._ _ _ _

____“What are we going to do?” Courfeyrac asked Jehan. The ginger shrugged._ _ _ _

____“We’re going to do everything we can do, and hope it’s good enough.” Jehan replied, “But I need you to get everyone out of here so I can do some damage control on the radio. We don’t know how many people saw that, but I bet it was on the radio as well.”_ _ _ _

____Courfeyrac nodded. It was sound advice. He ushered everyone out of the room to give Jehan some quiet for the broadcast._ _ _ _

____…_ _ _ _

____Bahorel came back soon after, confused as hell._ _ _ _

____“Hey,” He said to Combeferre, when he found him, “What was that bullshit on the radio?”_ _ _ _

____“Jehan’s broadcast?” Combeferre asked, snapping shut a notebook he’d been trying to plan in. He had nothing, no plan that wouldn’t sacrifice someone in some way._ _ _ _

____“No, I didn’t hear Jehan’s. There was a Tomorrow Comes broadcast, it went over all the stations, even ours. It sounded like Enjolras, but… maybe they got someone who sounds like him?” Bahorel asked, hopeful. Combeferre almost didn’t want to tell him the truth._ _ _ _

____“No.” He took off his glasses and pretended to clean then so he wouldn’t have to look at him, “There was a TV broadcast… it’s him. They say they’re executing him and Grantaire tomorrow. Marius is trying to see where they are.”_ _ _ _

____“We have to get them!” Bahorel said, turning back to the door, as if he was going to drive to the city himself and just whisk them away. Combeferre placed a hand on his shoulder._ _ _ _

____“I know, but it might be a trap. We have to be sure.”_ _ _ _

____“How can you say that, don’t you care what they’re going to do to them?” Bahorel shouted, waving his arms to demonstrate just how fucked up everything was._ _ _ _

____Combeferre gave him a look cold enough to make him fall silent. “You should help Bossuet and Joly.”_ _ _ _

____“What are they doing?” Bahorel asked, pretending not to be afraid of the man._ _ _ _

____“They’re staying away from me.” Combeferre shot back. Bahorel looked like he wanted to say something, but stalked away._ _ _ _

____A few moments later, Courfeyrac came out from behind a corner._ _ _ _

____“Is it safe now?” He asked, half teasing. Combeferre sighed._ _ _ _

____“No.”_ _ _ _

____“Well too bad.” Courfeyrac said, walking over and throwing his arms around his friend. “We’ll get them before anything really bad happens. We always do.”_ _ _ _

____“There’s a first time for everything.” Combeferre huffed._ _ _ _

____“I’m sure Marius thought of something by now.” Courfeyrac said. Combeferre laughed a little. That wasn’t the effect Courfeyrac had been going for, but he’d take it._ _ _ _

____“I should get back to work.” Combeferre said after a moment. Courfeyrac let go of him._ _ _ _

____“I should go make sure Montparnasse isn’t getting ready to kill us for not working today.” Courfeyrac said, and they parted ways._ _ _ _

____…_ _ _ _

____“They’re going to _die_ because I can’t figure out a fucking password!” Marius yelled, smashing his fingers on the keys. The password bubble assured him that that was not the correct password. _ _ _ _

____“Deep breaths.” Cosette said calmingly, “Breathe in… then out.”_ _ _ _

____Marius tried to take her suggestion for a moment, but failed, having thought of another idea._ _ _ _

____“Wait. I don’t have to find them if they’re dead.” He said, typing furiously._ _ _ _

____“But they’re not dead.” Cosette reminded him._ _ _ _

____“They’ve got to be buried somewhere, and it takes days to schedule to get a cremation in the city, even for the facility. There’s a trail here somewhere.” He said, looking through the death registrations. After a few moments of silence, he looked back up at Cosette._ _ _ _

____“Did you find them?” She asked, unsure if she should be hopeful or not._ _ _ _

____“Not at all. That means that either they’re going to be buried in secret, which is highly unlikely, or…”_ _ _ _

____“Or they’re not going to be buried at all.” Cosette finished._ _ _ _

____“Exactly.” Marius looked back at his computer with a better outlook, “Can you tell the others?”_ _ _ _

____…_ _ _ _

____After Cosette told everyone what Marius had discovered, they calmed down a little. Combeferre and Bahorel were both desperately and separately trying to think of plans in case Marius was wrong, but the others didn’t care. A few hours passed and Marius gathered everyone to the room with the computer so he could tell them what he’d found._ _ _ _

____“Alright.” Marius said, “So we know that everyone in New Paris has a data trail, right? Their ID, their stays at the facility, their homes and schools, it’s all tracked up until they die, and even then, there’s paperwork for a grave.”_ _ _ _

____“The only people off the map are runaways.” Joly commented, but Marius shook his head._ _ _ _

____“The general public can’t find information about runaways, but there’s still a trail. Tomorrow Comes tracks all the sightings and the missing person report, they don’t just burn the information. Grantaire and Valjean are exceptions, since they don’t have families anymore, but that doesn’t really matter now. Grantaire’s back in the system with his number, and Enjolras was easy enough to find.” He rambled._ _ _ _

____“So you found them?” Bahorel asked._ _ _ _

____“Not exactly. But there’s no executions scheduled, there’s no grave, and guess what? Enjolras’s family is going to be ‘hosting’ a reformed citizen next month.” Marius said._ _ _ _

____“What does that mean?” Musichetta, who hadn’t lived in the city, asked. “Like an Op?”_ _ _ _

____“Someone from the facility. It could be an Op, but people of Enjolras’s family’s standing don’t need the extra money hosting would give, so it must be someone they know.” Marius explained._ _ _ _

____“Enjolras.” Courfeyrac breathed, relieved._ _ _ _

____“Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking. This is a trap, we shouldn’t fall for it.” Marius said finally._ _ _ _

____“So nothing is going to happen to him?” Combeferre asked. Marius was about to answer, but he was cut off._ _ _ _

____“What about Grantaire?” Joly asked._ _ _ _

____“I assume he’s being given the same treatment. I can’t find him in the facility, but that’s because he doesn’t really have a last name. Apparently there’s a lot of people in the city with the first name Paris.” Marius muttered._ _ _ _

____Courfeyrac gave a surprised laugh, “Wait, Grantaire’s first name is Paris?”_ _ _ _

____…_ _ _ _

____At night Jehan made an announcement to the wastelands that they should not worry, the Amis were going to take care of it. He was going to announce it again in the morning, but for now it was time to sleep._ _ _ _

____He got in bed with Courfeyrac, wrapping his arms around his boyfriend. He was just drifting off to sleep, when Courfeyrac began to talk._ _ _ _

____“Is it bad that I’m really happy it’s not you in the facility right now?” He asked._ _ _ _

____“I’m glad you’re not there either.” Jehan said, “So I guess we’re both bad people.”_ _ _ _

____“At least I’m in good company.” Courfeyrac said. Jehan smiled and fell asleep._ _ _ _

____…_ _ _ _

____Months passed. The Amis got used to their jobs helping the Patron Minette. Even Courfeyrac had accepted his role. Time passed quickly, and soon it was time to put Marius’s plan into motion._ _ _ _

____“Are you ready?” Jehan asked Courfeyrac as they got in Baby 2.0 to go save their friends._ _ _ _

____“Yeah, if I have to spend another day in that strip club I’m going to lose my mind.” Courfeyrac replied. Jehan laughed and they sped off._ _ _ _


	8. Common People

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julien and Paris meet in the city.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so so sorry

Paris sighed as he stood on the factory floor. He was inspecting orange pill bottles for imperfections. He picked up one that was twisted in the middle and held it up to the light, trying to see the stamp that would tell him which machine it came from, so Paris could tell his superiors later. 

Through the clear plastic, he saw a man. He blinked. No, it couldn’t be, he’d made that man up in his dreams. The people at the facility told him so. He put down the bottle and looked at the man again, more closely. 

It was the same man. The same man he saw in his dreams, yelling _“No!”_ followed by a nonsense word. Paris had no idea what it might mean. Regardless, he had to talk to this man. Maybe he knew him, knew why Paris saw his face every night. 

Break started soon and the machines stopped. Paris rushed over to the man to talk to him, unsure of how he was going to ask him such a question. He followed the man to a table, where he sat down next to another ginger man, who was staring off into the distance. 

“Can I sit here?” Paris asked. The man shrugged and Paris sat down across from them. 

“I’m Julien, by the way.” The man said. Paris was grateful to have a name to attach to the face. 

“I’m Paris.” He replied. The ginger man said nothing, even though both of the men were looking at him. 

“This is Feuilly.” Julien said after a moment of silence. “They have him on a lot of medication right now. He trained me.” 

“Oh.” Paris said. He knew that he should be making small talk, that’s what everyone did at lunch, small talk. But all he could think about was his dream and how he finally found this person after so long.

There was another moment of silence as they ate their food. 

“Have you ever been to the facility?” Paris asked. Julien looked up at him questioningly and Paris scrambled for an explanation for his sudden question, “I, uh… I was just there and you look kind of familiar.” 

“Oh,” Julien looked confused for a moment, before nodding. “Yeah. I was just released a little while ago.” He gave a slightly reassuring smile. “I’m better now.”

“That makes sense.” Paris said. That explained why he knew the guy, but not why he always saw him screaming nonsense. He’d ask later, if he got to know him better. He’d been weird enough for one conversation. “What were you there for?” 

“I…” Julien paused, looking as if he were searching for words. Finally he spoke again, “Don’t recall. What about you?”

“I don’t know either. I guess I didn’t have a family before, so they can’t tell me.” Paris replied, smiling sheepishly. “Must have been bad. But I’m better now.”

Julien nodded and they ate in silence for a while. Paris felt like it should have been more awkward, but it wasn’t. Maybe they just weren’t talkative because of the medication. The bell rang, signalling the end of lunch. Feuilly got up first, surprisingly, and clapped both of them on their shoulders.

“We should go out after work.” The man said, and shuffled away without waiting for a response. 

“I guess we’re going out after work.” Paris said as they watched the man’s retreating figure. 

“I guess so.” Julien nodded watching Feuilly left them. He turned back to Paris, “I suppose we should meet by the factory gates?”

…

That night, the three of them went out for drinks. Paris didn’t remember hearing about them in any of the videos that prepared him for life in the city, but Julien assured him that it was fine, it was just a liquid version of the contentment medication. It was just supposed to make you happy. 

After a few hours they walked out of the bar, grinning at each other and at everything. Paris decided that the bar was his new favorite place, and Feuilly and Julien were his new favorite people. Feuilly disappeared on the walk home when Paris and Julien weren’t paying attention, but they figured he must have just gone home. 

The arrived at Paris’s apartment building. They looked at each other as they stood in the doorway, still unable to fight back smiles. 

“I had fun.” Paris said. 

“Me too.” Julien said, smiling wider. 

“I’m going to go inside now.” 

“Alright.” 

“You should go home, you live on the other side of town.” 

“I should.” Julien agreed. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow. Maybe we can hang out again?” Paris said uncertainly. 

“Tomorrow?” Julien asked, smiling up at Paris.

Paris laughed, “Yeah, let’s go out again tomorrow. Maybe we should wait until our next paycheck to go back to the bar though, I spent way too much tonight.” 

Julien nodded, “Same here. I don’t know how Feuilly goes out every other night.”

Paris nodded. Maybe the man was just paid a lot more than they were. “You should come over here tomorrow. We can watch one of the dramas.” 

Julien agreed.

…

The next evening they hung out again. Feuilly had invited himself along, or maybe he just got lost and followed them home. Either way, he was there now. And he was slowly taking up more and more room on the couch, forcing the two of them closer. 

Eventually Paris gave up his seat on the couch. It wasn’t socially acceptable for them to be sitting as close as they had been, Julien had almost been sitting on one of his legs. When he looked back at Feuilly, who was now taking up two entire couch cushions and moving in on a third, Feuilly gave him a displeased stare. Paris frowned. What was all that about?

… 

A few weeks later, when Paris was supposed to be inspecting bottles in the factory, he looked up and saw Julien. Julien noticed him looking and nodded, smiling a little. Paris smiled back, but when he went back to looking at the bottles he replayed the moment in his mind. Something about that seemed so familiar. 

_He could see Julien, standing in front of a table. Paris was slipping into the room, silently. He waved at the blond. Julien was talking into a microphone, but he nodded and smiled, the same way. Paris looked around. The room was full of color and wires, it was hot, nothing like New Paris. Where was he? What was going on?_

“Paris!” 

Paris snapped out of his trance to see his supervisor glaring at him. He spared a glance to Julien, who looked concerned. He focused back on the supervisor, who was now yelling at him. 

He was sent to the nurse to get some more medication administered. He wanted to complain, the contentment medication gave him a headache, but he didn’t. At least it was a holiday. That meant that all the factory workers got to go home at lunch, to spend time with their families. 

Paris figured he’d hang out with Feuilly, who didn’t seem to have a family of his own. At least, if he did he didn’t talk about it. When the bell rang to signal the end of the day, he walked towards the door to leave. 

There was a slight tug at his sleeve. When he turned around, Julien stood there, looking concerned, “Hey, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I just… I don’t think I can talk about it here.” Paris said, glancing at an Operative that stood by the door, “Maybe we should get lunch or something?”

“Yeah, sure. Where do you want to go?” Julien asked, starting to leave.

“Wait, what about Feuilly?” Paris asked.

“He’s with his family today.” Julien shrugged his shoulders a little, “You don’t mind if it’s just the two of us, do you?”

“I don’t mind at all.” Paris said quickly. 

He was a little irritated at Feuilly at the moment. The man had been up to some strange antics, leaving during all of the romantic parts of the dramas they watched, then insisting they retell him. He left them in Paris’s dark bedroom, filled with candles when the lights mysteriously went out, and didn’t return for half an hour, saying he was going to fix it. And almost every time he was there he forced someone off the couch by sprawling across it. All in all, it was odd behavior. 

They got to an outdoor restaurant near the factory and ordered their food. They had picked a seat close to the building, so no passing Ops or concerned citizens could overhear their conversation. 

“So… what happened at work today? Are you feeling alright, Paris?” The blond looked concerned as he idly stirred the straw in his glass of water.

“It’s fine now, it’s just… are you sure you don’t remember anything before the facility?” Paris asked, frowning, “I keep remembering… pieces. And you’re always there.” 

“No… I don’t remember any of it. But, if I’m being honest..” Julien sighed a little, looking nervous, “I keep getting this weird feeling that I’ve known you before.”

Paris nodded. “I know that I know you, I just don’t know why, you know?” 

“Exactly.” Julien agreed. 

They changed the subject, since it wasn’t safe to stay on the subject long in public. At the end, Paris pulled out his wallet to pay for his meal, but Julien stopped him. 

“I can pay. You’ve had a rough day.” Julien frowned.

“Thank you.” 

“It’s no problem.” Julien smiled a little at him, reaching out to put a hand on his shoulder, in reassurance, but quickly retracting it. “It’s no problem.” 

…

As they walked back to Paris’s apartment, he suddenly remembered why he didn’t think he’d be hanging out with Julien today. 

“Why aren’t you with your parents today?” He asked. 

“Oh…” He shrugged a little, “My parents are kind of weird… I mean, not like they need to go to the facility or anything. Just… they act like I’m still a kid, you know?” Julien looked a little lost in thought. 

“Oh. Well, were they like that before you went to the facility?” Paris asked. 

“I don’t actually remember them.” Julien sighed a little, “When I got back from the facility they just told me these were my parents.” 

“Huh.” Paris wished he knew why neither of them seemed to remember anything at all. What had they done? Paris had memories of Julien, did that mean they committed whatever crime they’d done together? “Do you know anyone? Aside from me and Feuilly?” 

“Well… there are these two guys I apparently went to high school with. But my parents just told me they were gone now. Maybe you know them too?” He looked at Grantaire, “You could come over… if you wanted to.”

“Sure, if your parents won’t mind me being over.” Paris agreed. 

“I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.” Julien said.   
The two took transit over to Julien’s neighborhood in North Sector A. It was the nicest sector in the city, and all the homes looked like tiny mansions in comparison to the small apartments and houses that populated the south sectors. Julien led him inside and his parents, a fairly ordinary upper-class couple greeted them and introduced themselves. Julien introduced Paris as his coworker from the factory, and explained that they would be going up to his room to watch the television special that was on tonight. He picked up a photo album on their way to his room. 

“What was your friend’s name, dear?” Julien’s mother asked. 

“Paris.” Julien replied, “Paris… what was your last name?” 

“Enjolras.” Paris replied. Julien’s mother frowned. 

“Enjolras?” She asked, “That’s our name. I didn’t think it was that common.” 

Julien also looked a bit upset, so Paris was quick to reply, “No, I don’t think it’s my real last name. It used to be something else, the people at the facility told me. I got better there a while ago, but I don’t know who my family was. I guess the facility just assigned me a name.”

“That makes sense.” Julien said, holding the photo album tighter, as if hoping his mother wouldn’t ask why he took it. She didn’t ask. “Let’s go to my room.” 

“I can bring you boys some food if you want.” Julien’s mother offered. 

“No thank you, we just ate.” Paris said, and they went to Julien’s room. 

Julien closed the door behind Paris, sitting on the bed and opening the album up, “These two. He’s from the Combeferre family. And he’s from the Courfeyrac family.” Julien said, pointing to two different teenage boys, grinning, each with an arm around Julien. “They just feel so much more familiar than just… high school.” 

Paris looked at the pictures, frowning a little. The boys did look vaguely familiar. He felt like it was odd to see them so young, but he had never seen them before, so that felt like an odd thought to have. “I feel like… maybe I know them too. But it’s hard to remember.” 

Julien frowned a little, “Too bad.” He looked disappointed, balling one of his fists a little. He was frustrated, he wished he could just remember. 

“I wonder what we did.” Paris sighed, leaning back on his hands. His fingers brushed Julien’s and he felt his heart jump. He didn’t move his hand away, pretending he hadn’t noticed. 

“Maybe we were rebels,” Enjolras said in a breathy laugh. He didn’t move his hand either, “Wouldn’t that have been wild?”

“Ha, yeah. That can’t be true though. Can you see _us_ as rebels?” Paris asked, moving his fingers so they were resting more firmly on Julien’s. 

“You’re right.” Julien laughed, using his laugh as an opportunity to lace his fingers carefully through Paris’s. Paris moved his hand so that they were actually holding hands. He looked over at Julien to see the man blushing. 

Paris knew this was wrong by all standards. The videos had told him so, and the people at the facility had taken extra care to assure him that homosexuality was very much illegal. Maybe that’s why they were here, him and Julien. Maybe they had been together. 

They kept up their conversation, just holding hands the whole time. When he left, he almost didn’t want to let go. 

…

Over the next couple weeks, Paris and Julien got even closer. Feuilly was leaving them alone more often, and though that confused them a little, it gave them more of an opportunity to just exist together in peace, without being afraid their friend would see them and report it back to the facility. 

They held hands whenever they were in private now, and when they walked each other home they hugged, one of the only allowed forms of contact. Julien kissed Paris’s hand once, when he hurt it, and it was all he could think about that night. 

Then one day, they were in Paris’s living room, sitting on the couch with the TV on, but not really paying attention to it. They had been theorizing as to what they had been doing before they got caught and brought to the facility. Paris’s favorite theory was that they robbed the treasury. Julien’s favorite theory was that they just snapped. They’d heard that one kid snapped a few years back and ran almost naked into a fountain. Julien said that that’s what they probably did.

Julien was talking, but Paris wasn’t paying any attention. He’d been drinking some of the liquid contentment, and he was in a happy haze, just gazing at his best friend. Without thinking, he moved closer, until Julien slowly stopped talking. He realized that he was very close to the other man’s face. 

“Why’d you stop talking?” Paris almost whispered. Julien shrugged. 

“I wanted to know what you were doing.” He said. 

“Oh.” Paris replied. 

“So what were you doing?” Julien persisted. 

Paris leaned in and kissed him, a soft, brief press of lips. He drew back. 

“That.” 

Julien stared at Paris wide eyed, cheeks flushed. His lips were still slightly parted, his expression was that of shock. 

“That… that was okay, right? I just thought… you know, since you kissed my hand that one time and all the other stuff…” Paris rambled. What if he’d been interpreting this wrong the whole time? What if Julien just thought people held hands? They should have talked about this first. 

Julien blushed even more, his cheeks bright red, he was speechless. He leaned in, giving Paris a soft, quick kiss on the lips. When he pulled back, he gave Paris a smile, to reassure him a little.

Paris calmed down after that and smiled back, taking Julien’s hand. They sat in silence for another moment. 

“So… does this mean we’re dating?” Julien asked, “I mean, in secret, of course.”

“Yes!” Paris said quickly, before regaining his composure, “I mean, sure, if you want to.” 

“I’d like that.” Julien smiled, looking away as he blushed. 

…

After Paris and Julien decided to be boyfriends, Julien submitted an application to move. He was overdue to be out of his parents’ house, but he hadn’t wanted to be alone quite yet. Roommating with Paris seemed to be the logical solution. 

The person who looked over his application asked if he was related to Paris, since they had the same last name. Julien said that he didn’t think so, but internally he was praying to anything that would listen that they weren’t. That would be so awkward. 

He moved in shortly after, his request being approved. They were great at living together, it felt like they were just friends hanging out most of the time, but they seemed to intuitively know when to leave each other alone or when the other needed company. Neither of them could explain it, it was just familiarity. 

They had been given an extra twin-sized bed when Julien moved in. After a few nights, they had moved the beds together. They weren’t one-hundred percent sure how to be intimate with each other, but that wasn’t what they’d moved the beds for anyways. Paris had started to get nightmares, the dreams where Julien was screaming nonsense were gone from his mind, replaced with dreams he couldn’t remember that left him bolting awake. 

The solution to his nightmares was for them to lay together at night. It didn’t stop them at all, but when he awoke and saw Julien, he would be able to go back to sleep. 

One morning, Paris slowly woke up. He opened his eyes blearily to look at the alarm clock. It was their day off, and it was early in the morning. He and Julien didn’t have any plans that day, there was no harm in sleeping in. He snugged closer to his boyfriend and sighed, ready to sleep. 

There was a knock. 

Paris looked up to see Feuilly, knocking on the wall as he looked at the two of them, tangled up in each other. Paris looked down to assess the situation and see if he could think of an explanation. He was shirtless. Julien’s arms were wrapped firmly around his middle. There was no explaining this away. 

“Please don’t tell anyone.” Paris said desperately. Feuilly frowned. He was not a man of many words and Paris knew he needed time to think before he spoke. 

“It’s good.” Feuilly said at last, “You’re good.” 

Paris took that to mean that Feuilly wasn’t going to tell. Julien began to wake up and Feuilly leaned against the wall, trying to smirk. 

“Feuilly?” Julien asked, pulling up the blanket as though he was the one exposed, though he was wearing a shirt. “What are you doing here?” 

“Your keys.” Feuilly said, tossing them to the blond. That explained how he got in. He gave Paris a two finger salute and left the room. 

“Is he going to report us?” Julien asked nervously. 

“Nah.” Paris replied, “I don’t think he cares.” 

…

Days passed. Julien and Paris got more comfortable around Feuilly, holding hands in front of him whenever he was over. He seemed pleased, or at least indifferent, with the whole affair. It was nice, to have someone they didn’t have to hide around. 

One day, Feuilly walked in with the paper, which was left on their doorstep every morning- mostly ads- and an envelope. He handed it to Paris, who was sitting at the table, and Julien leaned over Paris’s shoulders, half hugging him, to read. 

It was addressed to “Julien Enjolras and Paris Rene Enjolras (Or Enjolras and Grantaire (Or R (Or 82473)))”

“Which one of us Enjolras in the parentheses? Is it me or you?” Julien asked. 

Paris remembered his old dreams, of Julien screaming nonsense. He hadn’t expected it to be spelled like that. “I think Enjolras is you.” 

“Open it.” Julien said impatiently, after they looked at the envelope for a while. Paris opened it and they read the handwritten note. 

_Hey guys,_

_Please pack a bag and meet us by the wall in South Sector B near Futures Street, behind the abandoned convenience store at noon. Come alone. We know you have questions, all will be answered when you find us._

_The Amis_

“The Amis?” Paris asked, looking up at Julien. The blond shrugged. Paris read it aloud, hoping that maybe then he’d understand what was going on. Feuilly walked over, looking at the letter with interest. 

“What do you think Feuilly?” Julien asked after a moment. Feuilly frowned. 

“I’ll go with.” He said, “Pack.” 

And with that, Feuilly left, presumably to pack for himself. 

“What should we do?” Paris asked. 

“I guess we pack… They might know something about our past.” Julien looked hopeful, “Don’t you think?”

“Yeah.” Paris agreed, “We should hurry, it’s almost 10:30.”

They packed quickly, just throwing clothes and toiletries in bags. 

“Where are we going?” Paris asked, “What do you think we need?” 

Julien didn’t know why Paris thought he would know what they need, but he suggested food and water. They grabbed a couple cans of food and some bread. They had no idea how long they’d be gone. 

As an afterthought, Julien grabbed the photo album. He knew he couldn’t bring the whole thing, and he didn’t want to. He just wanted the picture of him and the other two kids. Maybe the Amis would know who they were. 

Feuilly returned shortly with a bag. He looked around the room, as if trying to see what they were leaving behind. He picked up both Enjolras and Grantaire’s charging laptops and slipped them in his bag. They were as thin as notebooks, so they fit fine. Feuilly didn’t seem to be bringing much along anyways. 

“Ready?” Paris asked. Feuilly and Julien nodded and he led the way to where the Amis told them to meet. 

…

They arrived at the meeting place five minutes early. No one was there yet, or so it seemed. Paris sighed and leaned against a wall. He wasn’t sure this was such a good idea. 

“Are you sure about this?” He asked Julien. 

“No.” He said, nervously rubbing the back of his neck, “But… it’s worth a shot.” He looked up at Paris, smiling.


	9. Make Room!!!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“Are you the terrorists they talk about in the city?”_
> 
>  
> 
> _Bahorel burst out laughing, too much so to answer._
> 
>  
> 
> _“Yes we are!” Jehan said cheerfully, “And you guys were too, up until a few months ago.”_

The wall that Paris was leaning on moved and he stumbled backwards, falling into the man coming through the hole in the wall. He was a tall, buff man, and his arms shot out to catch him. 

“Woah.” The man said, “Hey R, didn’t know you felt that way.” 

“What?” Paris asked, but the man got distracted. He looked up and saw Feuilly, and dropped Paris. Paris caught himself before his face hit the ground, but it was close. 

“Feuilly?” The man asked, rushing towards him and wrapping his arms around the ginger. “Oh my god. Oh my god, it’s you.” He looked towards the other people coming out of the wall, “Guys, it’s Feuilly!” 

“Feuilly?” A bald man said peeking through the opening. “What?”

“Yep.” Said Feuilly. 

“I thought you were dead!” The buff man said. 

“Same.” Feuilly responded. 

Julien looked around at everyone that had popped through the wall. There was a tall man clad almost entirely in black with a man, similar in stature to the giant that was hugging Feuilly. There was also a bald man, a ginger, and a tall girl who was holding a laser gun at the ready. They were all dressed colorfully and wore masks. Rebels.

“Oh my god- Paris, they’re rebels.” Julien gasped, taking a step back.

“Rebels?” Paris asked, taking a step back as well. He needed to think of a way to get them out of here. Feuilly was with the big one, so he obviously was one of them. He grabbed Julien’s hand and decided that they’d try to run to the left, since there were less people that way. He’d just started moving when a hand stopped Julien. 

“Wait,” The bald man said, holding onto Julien’s arm, “Let us explain-”

Julien let go of Paris’s hand so he could get the man off of him. He balled his fist and punched. His aim and strength was far better than he realized, and he hit the man square in the jaw, knocking him to the ground. 

“Ow, what the fuck!” The man said in a garbled voice. 

“Run!” Paris yelled, grabbing Julien’s hand so they could escape. But when he turned, he saw that the truly giant man, the one not holding Feuilly, was blocking his path.

The man leaned down and grabbed Paris, in what was basically a restraining hug. The ginger with the braid and the man who had been holding Feuilly grabbed Julien, keeping him from punching anyone else. The girl fell to her knees, helping the bald man. 

“Parnasse, show them your card!” The ginger said to the man clad in black. The man frowned. 

“It’s a terrible picture.” He said, clutching at his chest and, presumably, a pocket with the card. 

“Just do it!” 

The man sighed and pulled out an official looking, Tomorrow Comes certified card. The picture didn’t look bad. The man’s name was “Montparnasse”, but they were unsure if it was a first or last name, since it was the only name on the card at all. Julien and Paris stopped struggling. 

“We need to get you out of here, fast.” The ginger said, “Will you come with? Or do we have to carry you out?” 

Paris and Julien looked at each other. Paris shrugged. 

“We’ll come with.” Julien said at last. 

“Thank god.” The man called Montparnasse said, leading them out of the hole in the wall. “We don’t have much time before someone comes by.” 

Julien and Paris were ushered into a car. The ginger with the braid was driving, the big man Feuilly knew was in the passenger seat, and Feuilly, Paris, and Julien were all shoved in the back. 

“We’re taking the bikes.” The girl said, to the ginger, “See you at the base.” 

“See you, Chetta.” The man replied, and she sped off with the bald man holding onto her. “Montparnasse and the other man left in their own car.

The ginger started driving in silence, but once they were a bit away from the city, he spoke. 

“I’m Jehan.” He said, before laughing a little, “I didn’t think I’d need to introduce myself… I should have considered that.”

“I’m Paris.” Paris said automatically, “This is Julien.” 

“I know.” Jehan said, “We sent you a letter.” 

“I’m Bahorel.” The man in the front also introduced himself, “It’s good to meet you guys again. I guess you could say that I’m the hot one of the group.”

Jehan laughed like that was the funniest thing in the world, and Feuilly even cracked a smile, but Julien and Paris didn’t really get it. 

“How’d you find Feuilly?” Bahorel asked after a moment, “He doesn’t seem to be talking much.” 

“He’s on a higher dose.” Paris supplied, “He has a hard time with words, we think. And Julien’s the one who found him first.” 

“When I got to the factory he requested to train me.” Julien said, “We became friends after that.” The blond looked nervous, gripping the edge of his sweater sleeves, sticking close to Paris. “Are you the terrorists they talk about in the city?”

Bahorel burst out laughing, too much so to answer.

“Yes we are!” Jehan said cheerfully, “And you guys were too, up until a few months ago.”

Julien grew very pale. Paris was concerned. “Maybe… maybe we can talk about more a little later? When we’ve had time to process this.” 

“Sure.” Jehan said, not unkindly. “When we get back we’ll tell you everything you want to know.” 

There were a few moments of silence, punctuated only by Bahorel’s laughter. After a few moments, Julien seemed to remember something. He dug in his bag and pulled out a folded photo. 

“Hey, do either of you know these kids?” He asked, holding up the picture so Jehan could see it in the rearview mirror, “Well, I guess they aren’t kids anymore, but… We went to high school together? I think we were friends.” 

This set Bahorel off on another bout of strange laughter. Jehan nodded, staring determined at the road. 

“Yeah, we know them.” He said after a moment, “We can introduce you if you’d like.” 

“Yeah.” Julien said gratefully. The backseat passed the rest of the trip in silence. 

…

They arrived at the Amis base. The motorcycle Musichetta and Bossuet (Jehan had told them their names) had been riding was there, but no one was outside. Jehan assured them that all of their friends were inside. 

As soon as they were out of the car, Bahorel was attached to Feuilly holding his hand. Paris thought that that was a great idea, and grabbed Julien’s lacing their fingers together. Julien looked at him with a mixture of anticipation and fear. They followed the Amis into the base. 

The two people from Julien’s picture were standing there, among other unfamiliar, yet familiar faces. They were older than the picture, but then, so was Julien. 

“Julien, this is Combeferre and Courfeyrac. Combeferre and Courfeyrac, this is Julien Enjolras.” Jehan said, grinning directly at Courfeyrac. 

“Enj!” Courfeyrac cried as he and Combeferre rushed over. They both threw their arms around him, holding him tightly. 

“Don’t I get an introduction?” A man with a metal contraption on his back and leg asked indignantly. 

“Enjolras only asked about them.” Jehan explained. The metal man pouted. “Paris, this is Joly. Joly, this is Paris.” 

“I want his full name.” Joly replied, grinning.

“Paris Enjolras.” Jehan replied, pretending to be put out, but hiding a grin. Joly laughed. 

“Uh…” Paris said, “What’s going on?” 

Everyone looked at him, then looked back at Jehan.

“You didn’t tell them?” Courfeyrac asked. Jehan shrugged. 

“They said they didn’t want to know yet.” He explained. 

“They’re probably in shock or something.” Joly said, “I mean, we did rip them away from everything they know and love.” 

“Yeah, I heard Enjolras punched Bossuet in the face.” A teenager, who was standing by the door, chimed in. 

“He knocked his tooth out.” The woman Jehan had called Musichetta told the kid. 

“Really? Nice.” 

“Can you get off of me?” Julien asked the two men who were still holding onto him. They didn’t seem to hear him. 

Paris looked around wildly. Sure Jehan had seemed like a cool guy, but these people were obviously dangerous. He needed to get them out of there. There was a gun lying on the table. Actually, there were a lot of guns around in general, but there was one in reach. Paris took his chance and grabbed it. 

He pointed the gun at Combeferre and Courfeyrac, who were not letting go of Julien, even though Julien was still asking them to, getting more frantic. 

“Let go of him!” Paris yelled. All eyes were on him. He aimed his gun between Combeferre and Courfeyrac, switching every so often to be sure that they knew he would shoot them. For never remembering holding a gun, Paris felt it was easy to aim, like some part of him remembered. 

“Grantaire…” Joly said, holding up his hands. Paris looked around the room. Everyone seemed to be showing their hands except Combeferre and Courfeyrac, who were slowly letting go of Julien. “R, put the gun down.” 

Joly’s voice was soothing, but Paris didn’t trust him. He kept his aim trained on Combeferre, who seemed to be the more dangerous of the two who had been holding his boyfriend. 

“What. Is. Going. On.” He said, slowly. Maybe if he asked slowly they would actually answer this time. 

“Grantaire… put the gun down and we can talk about this.” Joly said, slowly approaching him. Courfeyrac moved closer to Julien, in a motion that seemed more protective than encroaching. Paris didn’t like it, regardless. 

“Get away from him!” He yelled. Courfeyrac took a step back. 

“Grantaire-” Joly tried again, but Paris just made a noise of frustration. 

“I don’t know who that is! Why do you keep calling me that?” Paris asked desperately. His head hurt. His hand was shaking more than it should have been, “I just want to go home.” 

“Where’s home, Paris?” 

Paris looked to see who had asked that. It was the blonde girl who hadn’t been saying much through this whole catastrophe. She took a step towards him, then another, but he didn’t feel threatened. She slowly crossed the room to him and put her hand on the gun, lowering it until it was pointed towards the ground. 

“Where’s home?” She asked again. 

Paris knew the answer. It was his apartment with Julien. It was going to the factory and then going to the bar with Feuilly. It was his boring life, that was his home. But looking at the strange faces before him, he was no longer sure. 

Paris looked back at Julien. He couldn’t ask him to leave, not when they’d just found his old friends, answers to questions they’d been asking each other for months. He let the woman take his gun. 

“I don’t know.” He said softly. He wanted to say something stupid, like that his home was wherever Julien was, but he couldn’t bring himself to say something like that in front of all these people. “I don’t know anymore.” 

“We can help you figure it out, if you want.” The woman offered. “I’m Cosette, and these are my friends.”

“Paris.” Joly said, getting his name right this time, “Why don’t you sit down. We can explain better this time.”

Paris agreed, that seemed like the best option for now. He and Julien sat on a couch together, alone, and everyone circled around them. Combeferre, who seemed to be the leader of the group, started off by introducing everyone. 

Then, the man began a short, convoluted story about who they were and why they were in the desert. After about an hour of explaining, he got to an end. 

“So… I never had any memories?” Paris asked. Combeferre told him that the facility took his memories away a long time ago. But that couldn’t be right, could it? 

“No, no. You got most of your memories back.” Musichetta explained, taking over for questions. Combeferre seemed a little worn out from the explanation, “You just don’t remember your last name. You did get your memories taken away, when you were seventeen or eighteen, but you got them back like three or four years ago.” 

Paris nodded and thought about this, but Julien also had a question. 

“We’re married? Is that why we have the same last name, officially?” He asked. 

“Uh…” Musichetta didn’t know how to answer and she looked desperately around, hoping someone would have an answer, “We don’t really know. Your wedding wasn’t exactly legal, but Grantaire somehow ended up with your name. We don’t know what happened in the facility, but that’s probably why Grantaire… I mean Paris got your name.” 

“That makes… sense.” Julien said, even though it really didn’t. 

“I’ve got another question,” Paris said, “Why did you all decide to up and leave to the desert? New Paris is great. Tomorrow Comes looks after us. Why would you want to leave?” 

Courfeyrac pointed between the two of them, “You know your little relationship was illegal, right?” He asked, sounding bemused. Paris shrugged. 

“It’s one dumb rule. I’m sure it would change as soon as the population increased. We didn’t have a problem keeping ourselves private. As long as we didn’t like… go out in public and start kissing, everything was fine.” Paris argued, and Julien nodded. 

Courfeyrac sputtered, seemingly unable to argue with Paris. 

“It’s… complicated.” Musichetta said at last, “There are a lot of reasons to distrust and dislike Tomorrow Comes, but we can tell you about that after you’re off the medication.”

Paris kind of wanted to argue, but he was tired. He didn’t want to have to think anymore today, he just wanted to curl up with Julien and wake up in the city where things made sense. He nodded his agreement. 

“Alright, I’ll show you your room so you can rest if you want.” Marius said, getting up from his seat. Hearing him talk reminded Paris of something Feuilly had said in the car on the ride there, the only thing he’d really said. 

He’d transferred the laptops from his bag to Paris’s and pointed to them. He said “Marius”, like the word had meaning, and then left them to their confusion once more, smiling stupidly at Bahorel. 

“Wait! Marius.” Paris said, opening his bag. 

“You remember Marius and not me?” Bossuet asked, his voice garbled by some cotton balls Joly had put in his mouth to soak up the blood. 

“No, Feuilly told us to give you this.” He said, pulling the laptops from the bag. He handed them, and their chargers, to Marius. The man looked enthralled with the flat pieces of technology and he glanced from them, to Paris, and back again. 

“Really?” He asked, excitement filling his voice, “For me?”

Paris nodded. It wasn’t like he and Julien really used them anyways. Marius looked like he wanted to throw himself at him, but restrained himself. 

“Can I hug you?” He asked, serious. Paris shrugged, then nodded. Marius threw his arms around him, rocking them a little on the spot, “Oh my god, this is so great!” He said, pulling Paris away at an arm’s length, “And I can try to find something to help you guys! I need to start modding this!” 

He ran off, seeming to forget that he was supposed to show them their room. 

“Make sure the tracking is off.” Combeferre reminded him. “Cosette, can you take them to their room, then?” 

“Yeah.” Cosette said, leading the way. She showed them a messy room. There were notebooks and clothes all over the floor, some filled with art and some filled with words. Paris figured that they were Enjolras and Grantaire’s notebooks. Enjolras wrote speeches and Grantaire drew. He’d never drawn anything before though. 

Paris frowned at an open notebook with a drawing of Julien laughing. 

“Hey,” Cosette said, breaking him out of his thoughts, “If you need me to talk to you guys, to answer any questions, just ask, okay? Any of us would be more than happy to help you.” 

“Thanks, Cosette.” Paris said.

“Thank you.” Julien added from the bed. Cosette nodded and ducked out, leaving them alone. 

Paris sat on the bed next to Julien. 

“Well… so that happened.” He said, frazzled. Julien laughed. 

“Yeah, I guess it did.” He said, still laughing. Paris never really appreciated how Julien looked when he laughed like that. He understood why Grantaire would want to draw it. 

“I’m going to sleep.” Paris said, peeling back the blankets. 

“I think my head would explode if I tried to stay awake any longer.” Julien said in agreement, getting under the thin blanket with him. 

The sun was still high in the sky, but it felt like three am to Paris. 

“Goodnight.” He said softly. 

“Goodnight.”

…

After Paris and Julien had been taken to their room (Courfeyrac was trying to refer to them that way in his head, he didn’t want to be the cause of a freak out like Joly had been) everyone filtered out of the living room, going off to do their own thing. Courfeyrac knew that they’d be back in a few hours, wanting to discuss ways to make their friends remember again, but they all needed a moment to celebrate and take it all in. 

Eventually, Combeferre was the only one left in the room with Courfeyrac. Jehan had gone to give a radio report, but he’d given his boyfriend a comforting kiss on the cheek on his way out. 

Courfeyrac sat down heavily next to Combeferre. 

“So, that could have gone better.” Courfeyrac commented. Combeferre took off his glasses and slid his face into his hands. 

“I just… I thought he would remember _us_ , you know? I thought we were… he wasn’t going to forget us.” Combeferre said. 

Courfeyrac bit his lip. He had no idea how to deal with this. He threw his arm around his friend. 

“It’s alright. He’ll remember us, Grantaire got his memories back.” Courfeyrac said comfortingly. 

“Yeah, after the facility kidnapped him and _gave_ them back!” Combeferre argued, looking up at Courfeyrac. “We don’t have those kind of resources!” 

“We’ll figure something out.” Courfeyrac said with more conviction than he felt. “You’ll see.” 

“Yeah.” Combeferre snorted, sliding his glasses back onto his face. “Well, I’d better get planning.” 

His tone was bitter, but Courfeyrac would take what he could get. He clapped Combeferre on the back. 

“That’s the spirit!” He said cheerfully, and walked out. He needed to find Jehan, this stuff was getting depressing. 

… 

When Paris and Julien awoke the next morning they wanted more answers, but they were unable to demand them, since they were sweating and shaking in bed, barely able to ask for water. 

“This is worse than our detox was.” Joly commented to Combeferre as he came back from treating them, “And I’m betting it was worse than yours.” 

Combeferre nodded, “Bahorel said that Feuilly is worse too. I’m betting they have a new drug,” 

“Do you think it’s safe? Quitting all at once?” Joly asked, looking at the door that held their friends in concern, “What if they can’t handle it?” 

“We don’t have that many options.” Combeferre said, but he looked unsure. “I’ll ask Montparnasse and see if he knows anything.” 

… 

Montparnasse did not, in fact, know much about the drugs in the city. He only knew about his own illegal brand. He told them the same things they knew to do, keep them cool and keep them hydrated. 

They stayed in bed for days, the Amis taking turns caring for them and for Feuilly. Jehan was on duty one day when Enjolras woke up. 

“Woah, hey.” Jehan said, stopping Enjolras from sitting up, “Don’t move too fast, you’ll hurt yourself.” 

“Can I… water?” Enjolras asked, his voice raspy. Jehan lifted a straw to his lips, holding the cup until the man had drunk his fill. He blinked a little, before focusing on Jehan. “Jehan?” He asked. 

“Do you remember me?” Jehan asked hopefully. Enjolras… Julien shook his head. Jehan sighed. “It’s alright. I just thought maybe…”

“Yeah.” Julien agreed, “Sorry.” 

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” Jehan chided. Actually, Jehan did think that he had things to be sorry for, but he was going to bring them up when the blond remembered who he was. “Besides, this is kind of like I’m paying you back.” 

“Paying me back?” Julien asked. 

“Yeah. There was one time when I was sick, it was my fault, but you stayed with me when I was feverish and delusional. You made sure that I knew no one hated me for what I did. Also, I called Joly a… variety of nicknames. Most of them involved him being beautiful?” Jehan tried to remember.

Julien laughed weakly. He didn’t quite remember this, but he had a feeling in his chest when Jehan talked about it, like it had been a joke between them. “What happened?” 

“Oh, well, you know. I tried to get a sketchy job to help pay a debt we’d racked up and ended up getting an STD. It was years ago though, don’t worry about it.” Jehan said, trying to laugh it off. 

Julien looked at him in concern, the levity gone and replaced with soul-crushing guilt and worry. “You’re sure? I feel like… it didn’t end well.” 

“Well, you helped get rid of a guy who took advantage of me. Courfeyrac was mad for a while, but he understood eventually. It all worked out fine in the end.” Jehan explained. 

“Yeah.” Julien agreed. He had no memory, no feeling for those things Jehan said, but they didn’t sound any stranger than anything else. He wanted to ask Jehan to tell him more, but Paris stirred awake beside him. 

“We can talk more later, when you’re more up for it.” Jehan said, going to give Paris some water, “I’ll still be here.” 

Julien fell asleep. 

… 

A week passed. Slowly, Paris and Julien felt better. They got to go out of their room, hang out in the living room while Musichetta changed their sheets. While they were sitting there in relative silence, Feuilly and Bahorel came in. 

“Feuilly!” Julien said, trying to get up and collapsing back on the couch, “Feuilly, are you okay?” 

“I’m fine, Julien.” Feuilly said with a grin, “Bahorel’s been taking care of me. Badly.”

“Hey!” Bahorel protested, “I only dumped water on you once, and that was your own fault.” 

“You’re talking.” Paris observed. 

“Yeah, now that I can actually think straight it’s easier to talk.” Feuilly said, “I was so doped up on the contentment meds in the city… I could hardly remember how to walk.” 

“I just thought you didn’t like to talk.” Julien said. 

“He never shuts up.” Bahorel groaned, “He’s just nagging me all the time. ‘Bahorel that was dangerous. Bahorel, what do you mean you got shot while I was away? Bahorel, I’m surprised you lived this long.’”

“Those sound like reasonable concerns.” Paris said. 

“Thank you! See, he gets it.” Feuilly said, crossing his arms. 

Paris decided that he liked this new, talkative Feuilly. He listened to the two of them talk, Feuilly and Bahorel. It was mostly bickering. He frowned, as they began to blur before his eyes. 

_“Grantaire, are you sure you’re up for this? I mean, I know Jehan usually does this, but what with Courfeyrac being gone…” Feuilly trailed off, looking haggard as he shuffled through the radio show he’d put together for Grantaire to read later that day._

_“Dude, it’s fine. I know you’ve got stuff to do.” Grantaire heard himself say, clapping his hand on Feuilly’s shoulder. Feuilly snorted._

_“Everyone’s gone out of their mind with Enjolras like this.” Feuilly said, rolling his eyes a little, “They think I’m in charge for some reason, since Combeferre won’t come out of his fucking lab.”_

_Feuilly started to walk away, and Grantaire was going to let him, but he paused._

_“Hey. Do you… you think he’s going to get better, right? He can’t just… die.” Grantaire said. Feuilly’s shoulders sank. There was a long pause._

_“Combeferre says it’s terminal and I don’t think he’d say that if he thought there was even a little bit of hope. Not about Enjolras.” Feuilly said at last. He turned and looked at Grantaire, “I’m sorry.”_

_“No, it’s fine, I’ll just…” Grantaire made a general gesture with the papers, “Do my thing.”_

_Feuilly nodded and walked away._

“Paris?” Julien asked. His face swam into view, a look of concern on his face. “Are you alright?” 

Paris looked around. Feuilly and Bahorel were still there, but they looked worried. Bossuet was there though, he must have come in when Paris spaced out.

“What was that?” Paris gasped, “I… I saw Feuilly, but not… really?”

“You might have had a flashback.” Bossuet said, gaining their attention. “You used to have them before, when you lost your memories the first time.”

“It was about me?” Feuilly asked, “What did you remember about me?” 

“It was about a radio show? You were giving me instructions on how to do a radio show.” Paris recounted, “And… Enjolras was dying? Or he was sick?” Paris turned sharply to look at Julien, “You’re alright, right?” 

“I’m fine?” Julien replied. 

“When did we even have that conversation?” Feuilly asked himself, “Oh. Oh! I remember. He was sick then, but he’s fine now, from what Bahorel tells me.” 

“Yeah, you helped him get cured.” Bahorel chimed in. 

“I did?” Paris asked. “How?” 

“Um… no one really knows, but you got him into the city to get cured and then you got him back out.” Bossuet said, “I came here to tell you guys that Musichetta is done with your sheets and you’re cleared to go back to bed. 

Paris was grateful. He’d already felt tired and weak from the withdrawal, but this memory had made him feel worse. Bahorel, Feuilly, and Julien filtered out of the room, but Bossuet stopped him. 

“Look, Paris, I know… I know you don’t remember me, but I was like your best friend. If you ever have any questions, you can come to me, okay?” Bossuet said, looking earnest. Paris nodded. 

“Yeah. I uh, I actually do have one question.” Paris said. Bossuet nodded eagerly, encouraging him. “So, are you with Musichetta or with Joly? Because I’m a little confused.” 

…

Two days later, Julien and Paris were sitting in the living room again, hanging out with the Amis as they tried to figure out a way to tell them how the two of them met each other, when Jehan burst in. 

“Guys, I have an idea!” He said, holding up a flash drive, “This thing has a bunch of our old radio shows on it, and it’s got the one where they first met. Kind of. Maybe they’ll remember something if we play it.” 

“Is that a good idea?” Marius asked, “I don’t remember that show going well…” 

“Wait, what could have gone _that_ badly on a radio show?” Cosette, who had not been there, asked. 

“It sounds like the best idea we’ve got.” Paris said, “These guys are just confusing us.” 

“I’m sorry that you guys met each other _twice_.” Courfeyrac said, “You could try to follow when I’m talking.”

Jehan plugged the USB into one of the laptops that Marius had with him. They turned the speakers up to max and listened as Enjolras’s staticky voice filled the room. 

 

_“It’s pathetic to see what we’ve become so dependent on these drugs that Tomorrow Comes shoves down the masses’ throats like giving head to The Man.”_

“Wait.” Julien said, “What does that even mean?” 

“Shh.” Courfeyrac said, giggling.

“We have to fast forward a little, they meet like half an hour after this.” Jehan said. They listened to high pitched songs go by quickly and Jehan scrambled to pause it when they heard a chipmunk version of Enjolras’s voice. 

_“And we’ll fight for our future and the future of all those who come after us! Rise up with me and come to the wastelands. These fuckers think they can control us with their pills and endless mindless agenda to fill up your days. Those of you listening from the city and out here in Hell with us- join the revolution! We’re changing the god damned world!”_

“That can’t be me.” Julien said, his heart dropping. Sure the city was stupid with its rules sometimes, but New Paris was his home! And he sounded so angry…

 _“I mean, everybody wants to change the world.”_ A new voice, Grantaire’s voice, chimed in. It was softer, as though he was far away from the microphone, _“But no one is willing to die for it. And that’s what you’re asking them to do. Die for it.”_

 _“Excuse me?”_ Enjolras sounded mad, indignant. Julien buried his face in his hands. 

_“I heard you on the drive over, you think that people will just throw down their meds and join hands and start singing or something, but that’s not realistic.”_ Grantaire said. There was something else about his voice. While Enjolras sounded angry, Grantaire sounded empty. _“You talk like the wasteland is some peaceful oasis, but I’ve been here for like an hour tops and I’ve already seen how drug dependent your little friends are.”_

 _“Our_ friends _? Those_ friends _work for Tomorrow Comes, we were only working with them to get that unlucky bastard over there who seems to have saved your sorry ass along the way. I don’t appreciate you waltzing in here like you have any idea what the fuck is going on.”_

 _“Ladies, we are on air you know.”_ That was Jehan’s voice. Julien glanced up at the man, who looked like he was trying to contain his laughter. 

_“I know!”_ Enjolras shouted.

 _“Ladies?”_ Grantaire asked quietly, before pressing on in his normal voice, _“My point still stands. You’re working with them. If your convictions were strong enough you’d find another way. I’m not judging you, but you shouldn’t disrespect your audience by lying to them.”_

 _“Disrespect? What do you know know about disrespect?”_ Enjolras’ voice wavered, but he continued _“Disrespect is what they’ve done to you, and to all those people in the city- in the wastelands…”_ His voice was no longer loud, but firm and seeping in rage, _“So please, say that again.”_

 _“You shouldn’t disrespect your audience by lying to them.”_ Grantaire repeated obnoxiously. There was a quiet laugh in the background. _“There’s more than one kind of disrespect, and if you want to gain any actual respect or followers for this asinine plan of yours, you’ll have to tell them the actual truth, not your idealized nonsense.”_

There was a sickening crunch, then a loud thud.

 _“Oh shit!”_ Jehan said, though his voice was laced with amusement _“You knocked him out!”_

The broadcast cut off. Jehan burst into giggles. 

“Oh man, I forgot that happened.” He said, wiping his eyes. “Marius might have been right.” 

“What happened?” Paris asked. 

“I punched you.” Julien replied running his fingers over his hand, “I… I can feel it. My hand’s sore like it just happened. And I feel… angry. Enraged.” 

“Yeah, you got that way a lot.” Courfeyrac commented, grinning. 

“...I…” Julien rubbed his knuckles, looking at a loss. “I’m sorry.” He looked genuinely concerned, upset even. He couldn’t imagined punching Paris- even if the Paris in the recording was being obnoxious. He hadn’t seemed to be any better.

Paris shrugged, “It’s fine. I don’t remember.” He turned to look at the others, “So… that’s from when I got out of the facility, right? Four years ago?” 

“Yeah.” Jehan said, “Fresh out of the facility and already making friends.” 

“I… I sounded like I hated them. Or at least disliked them. What… what do they do in the facility?” He asked, looking at Courfeyrac and Jehan for answers. They shrugged. 

“It’s not fun, in the facility.” Marius said, reminding them that he was in the room, “I was nowhere near as high profile of a criminal as you were, but it was pretty terrible. At the end they make you forget, or they make you too happy to care about what you went through, or so I’m told. I never really got that far.” 

“You should ask Bossuet.” Cosette said, taking Marius’s hand, “He was in the facility with you for a little bit. He’d be able to tell you about it.” 

Paris nodded. He and Julien exchanged a look. They both had more questions now, deeper questions. This wasn’t just about their missing memories, it was about why they were missing them. They needed to get more information. Maybe these rebels were onto something about Tomorrow Comes after all.


	10. Surrender the Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“You fucked up.” Feuilly said, “You better hope that there’s something worthwhile in one of those notebooks, otherwise I don’t think Courfeyrac is ever going to talk to you again.” Feuilly turned to leave as well, but looked over his shoulder one more time, “You might want to get the car back where you found it before he figures out you took it.”_

After Paris and Julien finished detoxing from Tomorrow Comes’s new and improved medicine, people started visiting them in droves. They came from all over, calling them Enjolras and Grantaire, and telling them how they’d positively affected their lives. 

After an incident where the Students triggered a flashback for Paris, a flashback to when Grantaire and Enjolras had gone to a concert together for the first time, Jehan asked everyone to refrain from visiting for the time being. They could come once Paris and Julien were Grantaire and Enjolras again. 

“What if I don’t want to be Enjolras?” Julien asked Paris one night, as they lay together discussing what had happened that day, “He’s kind of an asshole.” 

“I don’t know. Their friends seem nice, I don’t see why they’d be terrible people if their friends are so cool.” Paris reasoned. 

“I know, I just… I don’t understand why they’re so mad at the city. Maybe if I understood that… then maybe I’d remember things better.” Julien said, sighing in frustration, “You seem to be remembering things faster than me.” 

Paris shook his head. “I just get these short little bits. You know people. You remember them.” 

It was true, in a way. They’d discovered that Julien had a knack for sensing how he’d felt towards people and in certain situations. Their friends were happy to find that he felt amicably towards them, while Montparnasse was disappointed when he was faced with contempt. The man had just wanted to convince Julien they loved to gossip and braid hair, was that too much to ask? 

“We should see if Marius and Combeferre are getting close to finding a cure.” Paris said. 

“In the morning.” Julien said. It could wait until the morning. 

…

Morning came and neither of them were any closer to a cure. However, a man named Jean Valjean, Cosette’s father, showed up with a host of ideas.

“Now, none of them worked on me, but they might be of help to you.” He warned. 

None of the herbal remedies that people in the wastelands used worked. Nor did the weird hypnosis tapes. Paris did respond to his number from the facility, but that was only because he recognized it from the papers he got when he was discharged. 

“There is one last thing.” Valjean said, taking out a home video labeled _”Tomorrow Comes Testing Channel”_.

“We already tried having them listen to a radio show.” Jehan, who had been watching, said. 

“Seeing is a lot different than hearing. We’re very dependent on our sight.” Valjean reasoned, popping it into the TV. There were a few seconds of static before a man came onto the screen, talking about a special thing happening. 

Suddenly, Julien was onscreen. His eyes were empty. He rambled out a speech in monotone, then the screen switched over to a painting, signed with Paris’s facility number. 

“I… I don’t remember this.” Julien stuttered. His chest felt hollow, like someone had come and scooped out everything that was inside. His eyes unfocused. “I don’t… Why would they… I don’t remember?” 

Jehan glanced over at Paris, who seemed to be having a silent flashback. He was staring at the screen intently, even though it was only static again. Jehan frowned. This didn’t seem like a good idea at all. 

“Hey.” Valjean said to Paris, taking his shoulders, “Paris, what do you see?” 

“They’re making me paint something.” Paris said, “I didn’t know I could paint. I remember this man. He was screaming.” 

“Screaming?” Jehan asked, his voice barely above a whisper. He glanced at Julien, who was looking at his own shaking hands. Jehan decided that Julien needed him more than Paris at the moment. He knelt down in front of the man. “Julien, are you okay?” 

“No.” Julien said, “Why would they do that? Why would they make me say things and then make me forget? I was doing what they wanted, why would they make me forget if I was following the rules?” The blond seemed to come back to himself a little more, looking around. 

“Paris, what else are you seeing?” Valjean asked Paris, drawing the others’ attention. 

“They took me back to the room again and… I don’t want to do testing. Not anymore, please.” Paris’s voice was desperate, but luckily Jehan knew how to take care of this one, from situations that happened years before. 

“Paris… 82473. You’re fine. No testing today.” Jehan said. Julien looked at him strangely, but Paris relaxed. 

“No testing.” He repeated. A few moments later, he seemed to come back to himself. “What was that tape? What happened?” 

Jehan glanced back at the TV, which was still displaying static. “That’s the first we heard from you guys once you were captured. They said you were going to die, but Marius found out they were lying.” 

“Oh.” Paris said. He couldn’t think of anything else to say. 

…

After everyone had calmed down a little, Valjean sat to eat lunch with Paris and Julien, before he would leave to go back home. 

“How do we know you?” Julien asked after a moment, “I mean, I know Cosette is your daughter, but you’re helping us an awful lot.” 

“Well, Julien, I know you as the leader of a rebel group that took over my house for several weeks.” Valjean said in a fake stern voice, before smiling, “You used to look up to me a lot, you know?” 

“I did?” Julien asked. He did feel more respectful around the man, maybe that explained it. He just thought it was the views Tomorrow Comes had instilled in him, to respect his elders. 

“And we bonded over being from the facility.” He said to Paris. 

“You’re from the facility too?” Paris asked, “How did you get out? How did you get here?” 

Valjean laughed. “That is a long story, boys. I don’t think we have enough time.”

…

Courfeyrac came to Paris and Julien that evening while they were sitting in the living room, looking through their respective notebooks and trying to force themselves to remember something. 

“Hey guys.” Courfeyrac said, sitting down next to them, “I made you something today. I uh, noticed you didn’t have your rings anymore, so here!” He opened his hands to reveal two shiny, metal rings. 

“Um.” Paris said, scrambling for something to say, some kind of response. 

“I mean, I know you two are together and I know you don’t remember being married, but… I just wanted to do something, you know? Your wedding was like… it was like one light moment in this whole shitstorm of despair. And even though you don’t remember it, I want you to know that we appreciate everything the two of you have done for us, as a group. I mean, Enjolras was our leader, but Grantaire kept him sane.” He put the rings in Paris’s hands, “You don’t have to wear them, but… We’re trying to make this right, guys.” 

With that, Courfeyrac left. Paris looked down at the rings in his hand. 

“If… if you want to wear them…” Julien began, but he stopped himself. 

“Yeah?” Paris prompted. 

“If you want to, we can. I mean, if you want to though.” Julien said. Paris grinned. 

“Yeah, of course. Of course I’ll wear it.” He said, taking one of Julien’s hands and slipping the ring onto his finger. Julien took his hand and did the same. 

“This feels so weird. I feel happy. Beyond happy.” Julien said, giggling. 

Paris kissed him on the cheek and got up, they had things to do besides sit around and revel in this small moment of happiness, despite how much they wanted to. Marius had wanted to talk to them. 

…

Marius had not called them in to talk to them about a cure, though he did mention that he could not find anything anywhere at all that was helpful. No, he called them in to try to share some memories.

“I just… I couldn’t stop thinking about it, I wanted to tell you these things before I forgot, just in case you never _did_ remember, so you at least knew these things happened.” 

He then proceeded to tell them about their wedding, about this one time when Enjolras said something super nice about him, about how Grantaire always told him the best jokes (he tried to retell a few, but he kept messing up the punchline), and about how they were always so protective of each other. 

After half an hour, he was done. Marius had kept each story brief enough that it hadn’t sent Paris into flashbacks, but Julien felt things associated with what he was telling them. At the end, Marius pulled out a little box. 

“I see Courf gave you the rings.” He said, “Cosette told me to give you these, since she’s with her dad today.” 

Paris took the box and opened it. Inside were two black masks. One of them had a wobbly smile on it.

“You lost your masks when you were taken, so we figured we’d give you new ones. Can’t have everyone knowing who you are.” Marius said, laughing as if it was a joke. Paris supposed it kind of was. 

…

Things went like that for another few days. The Amis were trying to trigger memories with stories, and Jehan would make them listen to old radio shows every once in a while. 

Joly told them a detailed medical history of their lives. He said that it was less for their memory and more so that they knew what was wrong with them if there ever happened to be cause for alarm. He seemed a little bitter when he talked about Enjolras’s many bouts of coughing over the years, but Paris and Julien didn’t question it. 

Musichetta and Bossuet got Paris alone one day. They said that they wanted to tell him how they met. 

“You see,” Bossuet said, “You were famous in the city before you were taken. You’d paint all these controversial pictures all over the walls. And your most famous painting was of Enjolras.”

“The one with his fist in the air?” Paris asked. He’d seen it drawn in notebooks. 

“Yep. Full color, all over the back of the Ping Pong Palace.” Bossuet said, sighing dreamily at the memory. 

Paris glanced down at his T-shirt. It was from the very ping pong place they were speaking of. He’d been wearing it since they got out of the city (though Musichetta washed it once).

“Then you disappeared.” Musichetta said, “Like we told you.”

“But then I got captured and I was in a room with you and after like a week you told me to watch you do something.” Bossuet continued, “You reached under your mattress, pulled out a needle, _stabbed yourself in the finger_ , and painted the exact same picture on the wall. In your blood.” 

“In my blood?” Paris asked, uncertain. Bossuet nodded. 

“Then me and Joly stormed the place.” Musichetta interjected, before Paris could react any further, “And they _insisted_ on taking you and I had no idea _why_.” 

“She grew up in the wastelands.” Bossuet explained. 

“Hold up.” Paris said, “I drew a picture in my _blood_?”

“Yeah, it was pretty hardcore.” 

…

Meanwhile, Courfeyrac had cornered Julien, who really just wanted to go take a nap. The day had been draining. 

“I thought your boyfriend would never leave.” Courfeyrac said, draping himself across the couch next to Julien. 

“Why did you want him to leave?” Julien asked, wary. 

“I miss you! I miss talking to you, we were best friends after all. And last time I tried to get you alone your boyfriend almost shot me.” Courfeyrac whined. 

Julien nodded. That was a fair point. “What did you want to talk about?” 

“Oh anything. I know you have the emotional range of a carrot at the moment, but that’s alright. I accept you.” Courfeyrac patted Julien on the head. He glared at the man. 

“You’re kind of a dick. I can see why Enjolras was friends with you.” Julien commented. Courfeyrac let out a surprised laugh. 

“There’s still some of you there after all!” He said cheerfully, and launched into some story centered around him, Enjolras, and Combeferre in a supply closet in the city. 

…

Throughout the time Julien and Paris were trying to get their memories back, the Amis were explaining to them why Tomorrow Comes was bad, and Julien and Paris had to admit they they had a point. Class systems no one could really break out of, forced labor, no real say in anything, ever. All of this aside from their terrible treatment of homosexual people and their sexism towards women. It wasn’t hard to see why Enjolras had been so mad, and why Grantaire had made such public displays against their system. 

At some point, Marius had called Montparnasse to see if Montparnasse could get any information out of Javert. Since they’d given Javert shelter during the bombings he’d seemed to be trying to turn over a new leaf, to help people from the inside. They had an inkling that he was the reason the wastelands were getting warning about the upcoming relocation to the city. Regardless, the man had no idea how to reverse a memory wipe and he told Montparnasse not to bother him with pointless questions. 

Combeferre and Marius were at a loss. They didn’t know what to do. 

“I think we just have to keep triggering flashbacks.” Combeferre said. “That’s all we have to work with.” 

“I don’t think so.” Marius said, shaking his head, “I don’t think that stress is good for them. It would cause more harm than good.” 

“So we just let them live like this?” Combeferre asked, frustrated. 

“Grantaire got along fine before.” Marius said with a shrug, “They’ll make new memories. This isn’t the end of the world.” 

“This isn’t just Grantaire this time!” Combeferre almost-yelled. He cleared his throat. “I’m just saying. Enjolras is the face of this revolution. If he’s gone, everything will collapse. We need him.” 

Marius shook his head, “You saw how many people came to see them. This has brought people together, more than anything. I think you might be overreacting” 

Combeferre glared at him, silent. “Marius, you can go.”

“Combeferre-” Marius reached out his hand, but stopped. 

“Get out of my lab.” Combeferre said, his voice cold. Marius withdrew his hand and left. Combeferre took a deep breath. 

He knew what he needed to do. 

…

“So, why is the kid here?” Paris asked as Combeferre drove him, Julien, and Gavroche out for a field trip. 

“Why are _you_ here?” Gavroche asked obstinately. 

“Well I’d rather be in the city, but someone had to go and kidnap us.” Paris said, though it was a lie at this point. He liked the wastelands. 

“Why am _I_ here?” Julien asked, “What are we doing?” 

“We’re going to this place that used to be our base.” Combeferre said from the front seat of Baby 2.0. 

“Not the Musian.” Gavroche said, his eyes wide. Combeferre looked at him in the rearview mirror. 

“Not the Musian.” He assured him, “We’re going to a hotel. Back when we had seventy-five members we lived there.” 

Gavroche let out a breath of relief. 

“There were seventy-five of us?” Paris asked. 

“Well, not when you were around. This was a long time ago,” Combeferre said. They pulled up in front of a pile of rubble. “My lab is underground, in a basement. We found a way to access it, back when we were cleaning up after it got bombed, but I didn’t get the chance to get any of my notes, the Operatives had closed in.”

“Why would you be able to get them now?” Julien asked. 

“They don’t have the manpower in the wastelands like they used to, and none of us have come back here in years. They probably think we forgot about it.” Combeferre reasoned. “I’m going to go look. If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, send Gavroche to get me.” 

They all got out of the car. Julien crossed his arms as Combeferre hurried off to wherever his lab had been. 

“So you just took us here so we could stand around?” Julien called after him. Combeferre didn’t respond. 

“This is lame.” Gavroche complained, “First mission with a gun and I’m just babysitting you two.” 

“You’re babysitting _us_? Gavroche, _we_ are babysitting _you_.” Paris countered. 

“Then why don’t you have a gun?” Gavroche shot back. 

“I have a bad track record with them.” 

Julien listened to them bicker for a moment, letting his gaze wander. He noticed an out-of-place pillar, a few feet from where most of the rubble was. He squinted at it, the lone pillar filled him with dread. Paris and Gavroche were still talking, so he approached it alone. 

The pillar was concrete, with shaky, faded, spray paint. 

_”Gone But Not Forgotten”_ , the pillar read. Julien took in a sharp breath. He wrote that. He could remember getting spray paint on his hands. He was crying when he wrote it, he could hardly hold the can in his hand. 

_The world around him disappeared. The ground was shaking, he could hear people screaming and sobbing. What was going on? Why was this happening? He could see Combeferre, his eyes were bloodshot. His arm hurt, it felt like someone had tried to rip it off, but left it there when they failed. But none of that mattered._

_The building was falling. He’d gotten out in time, but not soon enough to be of any help to anyone. Courfeyrac was there and he felt relief, even through guilt and grief and panic. He could see Angelica’s hand sticking out of the ground, like it grew there, like a flower. It was horrific._

Paris looked over as he heard his boyfriend scream “No! I have to go back!”

Paris ran over, followed by Gavroche. Julien was breathing hard, coughing. His hands were clawing at the ground, like he was looking for someone. 

“I can’t let them _die_!” Julien cried. Paris looked at Gavroche, helpless.

“What do we do?” He asked. 

“How should I know?” Gavroche asked, just as panicked. 

“Well, how should _I_ know?” Paris shot back. 

“You have these flashbacks all the time!” 

“Yeah, but I’m not like this!” Paris looked back at Julien, who was hyperventilating. “Okay, okay Julien. You have to breathe.” 

“R?” Julien asked. Paris was confused for a moment, before he remembered that that was him. 

“Yeah, it’s R.” Paris said, “Breathe.” 

“Why are you here? You’re not supposed to be here!” Julien yelled, breathing harder, “You’re safe. You’re in the city. You’re not here.” 

“We’re in the city.” Paris said said, scrambling to remember the name Bossuet had told him that he called Julien before they knew each other’s names. This was all very confusing. “Apollo!” He said, triumphant. “Apollo, we’re in the city.” 

“No, there’s bombs!” Julien said, not taking the bait, “Everyone… everyone is dying, R. You’re not supposed to be here, you’ll get crushed!”

“Apollo, I’m fine.” Paris said desperately. Julien shook his head, “Gav, go get Combeferre.” 

Gavroche nodded and raced off. 

Paris spent the next few minutes continuing to try to snap Julien out of his flashback. Finally, Combeferre arrived, holding a stack of notebooks. He pulled a syringe out of his pocket. 

“No!” Paris said, grabbing Julien and pulling him to his chest protectively. 

“It’s a sedative.” Combeferre explained while Juline continued to yell into Paris’s shirt, “It’s the only way to make this stop.” 

Reluctantly, Paris let go of Julien. Combeferre stabbed him with the needle. Julien’s eyes rolled back into his head and he fell into Paris’s arms. 

“We’d better get him back home.” Combeferre said. 

The ride back to the base was silent. When they got there, and Paris carried Julien inside, they found Feuilly and Courfeyrac waiting for them. Courfeyrac immediately freaked out. 

“What… what the fuck happened? Are you okay?” He asked Gavroche, “What happened, are you hurt?” 

“I’m fine.” Gavroche said, pulling away from Courfeyrac as he tried to examine him, “We went to the hotel, the one that’s rubble now and Julien freaked out. We couldn’t get him to stop screaming, so Combeferre knocked him out with a sedative.” 

Courfeyrac’s gaze turned hard at the explanation. “Gavroche, you should take Paris and Julien back to their room.” He said. Gavroche looked like he wanted to protest for about a nanosecond, but led Paris, who was still holding Julien, to his room. 

Courfeyrac turned his glare to Combeferre. Feuilly crossed his arms, waiting for an explanation.

“I was getting my notes back.” Combeferre explained, “I think I figured out how to fix this.”

“ _Notes_?” Courfeyrac asked, astounded at his friend’s stupidity, “You dragged him to his own personal hellscape for _notes_?” 

“I didn’t drag him there for the notes! I could have gotten those on my own-”

“So you took him there on purpose?” Feuilly asked, “You wanted to trigger this. Marius told me about your theory, but I thought you might have actually listened to him instead of going off on this insane fucking thing.”

“Wait, _what_ theory?” Courfeyrac demanded, looking between the two of them, “What could you have possibly thought could justify this?”

Combeferre was silent for a moment before opening his mouth to speak. He stopped again before finally speaking, “I thought… If Enjolras had a flashback he may start remembering things again. He remembered R, Grantaire told me.” 

“No, that’s _not how these things work_.” Feuilly spat, “Do you even _remember_ when Grantaire lost his memory the first time? The flashbacks didn’t trigger anything besides that _specific_ memory. That’s all. So you just gave Enjolras a crystal clear memory of the worst day of his life. Congratulations.” 

“And you brought _Gavroche_.” Courfeyrac added. “You gave him a _gun_! Don’t think I didn’t notice. What was he supposed to do, _shoot Enj_ if things got out of hand?” 

“That’s not what it was for!” Combeferre defended himself, “It was a _mission_. I couldn’t leave Enjolras and Grantaire out there alone while I got my research! What if Operatives had happened to come by?” He demanded. “He needed that gun!”

“You were going to pit Gavroche, _MY SON_ against fucking _OPERATIVES_?” Courfeyrac yelled, “What the fucking _hell_ were you _thinking_? He is a _CHILD, MY_ child. How the fuck did you think you were going to explain that to me? To _Jehan_? What if he got hurt?” 

Combeferre clenched the notebooks he held tightly, hands shaking, “I had to do something.” He said, voice uneven, but quieter than before, “He doesn’t remember anything. Nothing is helping. He doesn’t remember me- us- anyone- We need him.”

“Well, I hope you’re fucking happy with yourself.” Courfeyrac said, glaring at him, before turning to leave. “I can’t fucking look at you.” 

Courfeyrac left, leaving Feuilly and Combeferre alone. 

“You fucked up.” Feuilly said, “You better hope that there’s something worthwhile in one of those notebooks, otherwise I don’t think Courfeyrac is ever going to talk to you again.” Feuilly turned to leave as well, but looked over his shoulder one more time, “You might want to get the car back where you found it before he figures out you took it.” 

And then he was gone, leaving Combeferre alone. Combeferre took off his glasses, wiping at his eyes. He looked back down at the notebooks he held. He had to find something to help but- but first he had to talk to Grantaire. Enjolras likely would be out cold for at least another hour, and the man was probably still scared and confused about what had happened. It was the least he could do.

… 

Paris was waiting outside his and Julien’s bedroom. He’d heard most of the conversation, no one had been trying to be quiet. He knew for a fact that Joly and Bossuet were hiding out in their room, steering as clear as they could from the drama. Moments after the shouting had ceased Combeferre came up the stairs, frowning when he saw Paris waiting for him there. 

“I’m sorry.” He sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose, “I really did think it might help.”

Paris held his hand up, not wanting excuses. “What other things would trigger something like this? I need to know so we can stay as far away from that as possible.”

Combeferre cleared his throat, “Well… Julien has a… condition. It mostly started after the bombing of the hotel. A lot of people died that night, a lot of his friends. After that he was never really the same. He has severe anxiety problems, and something called post-traumatic stress disorder. There was another time he was like this… much worse though… it was when we were on our way back from a trip to California. You went off with Gavroche and Jehan to scout the area we set up camp near when you got shot in a misunderstanding. It was bad, they weren’t laser guns, and Enjolras- he snapped. He killed both of the kids that had hurt you, and after that he never wanted to leave your side. His nightmares were awful, but you were always able to calm him down. Before you left on the mission that got the two of you captured… you convinced him to let you go. He hadn’t wanted to let you come along, he was worried. I suppose it was with good reason.” Combeferre looked at Paris.

“Is there anything else I should know?” Paris asked, trying to take in the information while still looking cross with Combeferre.

“A few years back Enjolras was sick- dying. He had dust in his lungs and you convinced him to go to the city to get cured. I don’t know what the facility did to him in there, but when he got back you both agreed you’d rather die than ever go back. I suppose that’s why you had to stop Enjolras from shooting himself. When he got caught.”

Paris nodded seriously. “Thank you.” 

Combeferre moved to walk away, to read in his room or something, but Paris spoke again. 

“Did… did you have a problem with Grantaire? Or something?” He asked. 

“No.” Combeferre raised an eyebrow, why would he ask that? “Why?”

“It’s just… everyone else here seemed to like him. Grantaire. But you don’t. You only care about Julien- Enjolras. And I get that, believe me. Julien is awesome, but I just thought that maybe you didn’t like me or something. You don’t seem to care if I get my memories back or not.” 

“Grantaire lost his memories before, and he handled it just fine.” Combeferre said evenly, although it was only half true. “I suppose if I had to say, I do have a bit of a problem with Grantaire. Around that time Enjolras was sick he led him to what everyone thought was his death. A suicide mission. We thought he was dead and he neglected to tell anyone that they had planned it together. Imagine thinking your best friend was dead for a week.” 

“So, kind of what you did today? Not telling anyone your plan?” Paris asked, glaring at the man. 

“That was different.” Combeferre muttered, turning to leave.

“I’m sure.” Paris replied, walking back into his room and slamming the door. 

…

Paris and Bahorel (who had come in just to ask why Feuilly was so mad, but stayed to listen to Paris rant about Combeferre) were sitting together when Julien woke up. 

“Hey, how are you feeling?” Paris asked, coming to the side of the bed. Julien scrubbed his face with his hands. 

“I’m… I’m so _fucking_ angry.” Julien said, looking around the room, “Everyone died! Tomorrow Comes killed _everyone_!” 

“Not _everyone_.” Bahorel said, “Some of us got out.” 

“Not enough!” Julien yelled, “How could they do that? They said they were taking care of us! How could they bomb all those people, there were innocent people! Some of them were just _kids_.”

“Woah, you need to calm down.” Paris said, “Take a deep breath.” 

“No! I will not calm down! This is a fucking outrage! We have to do something, we can’t let them get away with this!” 

“No, no, stop that thought right there.” Bahorel said, sitting on the bed next to Julien and grabbing him in a restraining hug, “We tried it that way last time and it did _not_ work out.” 

“Last time?” Julien asked. 

“Yeah, haha. We um… we took some bombs and blew up a bunch of Ops.” Bahorel said, laughing like it was a joke, “Don’t tell Feuilly though.”

Julien laughed at the absurdity of it. There was no way that could have happened. “Yeah, okay.” He said. It calmed him down though. That was good. 

“Can I let you go now?” Bahorel asked, as if Julien was going to run off and kamikaze some Operatives. 

“I wish you would.” Julien replied. Bahorel laughed again and let him go. 

“I’m going to tell Feuilly you’re awake. He wanted to make sure you were okay.” Bahorel said, getting up. He left them alone together. 

“We should just run away.” Paris said, “These guys are insane.” 

“We can’t go back to the city.” Julien said, “We know too much now, we know they’re wrong.” 

“I know. We could start a new life in the desert. It’d be nice. Peaceful.” 

“Yeah.” Julien sighed. “But we can’t help anyone by being peaceful.”

Paris sighed, but before he could respond Feuilly burst in. 

“Oh, thank god you’re okay. I was going to kill Combeferre myself.” Feuilly said, grabbing Julien in a hug. 

“I was pretty mad, but Bahorel cheered me up.” Julien said, shrugging as best as he could with the ginger wrapped around his shoulders.

“What’d he tell you?” Feuilly asked. Bahorel shook his head from the doorway, but Julien disregarded it. 

“Oh, he said we blew up a bunch of Ops. It was too crazy to be true. I’d never do something like that.” Julien said, laughing. 

Feuilly shot a death glare at his boyfriend. “You did _what_?” 

“It… it was safe?” Bahorel tried. Feuilly got up and stood, right in his face like he was about to yell, but sighed instead. 

“I can’t deal with you people. Nope. I’m going to bed. You can sleep on the couch, Bahorel.” He said, walking past him. 

“Dude.” Bahorel said to Julien, before chasing after his boyfriend.

“Well. That happened.” Julien said, echoing Paris’s words from weeks ago. Paris snorted. 

“Let’s go to sleep. I just want today to be over.” 

Julien agreed.


	11. Burn Bright

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The chapter in which progress is made.

Over the next week, Combeferre locked himself away in his lab, away from everyone. During that week, Julien and Paris started actually fitting in with the group. The Amis had started to give up hope for them getting back their memories any time soon, so they figured they’d just help them get adjusted to life in the wastelands. 

Musichetta took them shooting. They were good, since they remembered something about it somewhere in the back of their minds, but Musichetta told them that there was always room to get better. The other Amis also tried to help they get back into things, with varying levels of success. 

“What do you mean, you don’t want to do the radio show?” Jehan asked Julien after the subject was brought up one day, “You were just saying how you wanted to make a difference.” 

“Talking was Enjolras’s thing.” Julien said, “I’m not him. I can’t do it.” 

“Nonsense.” Jehan said, “You’re the same person. No matter what, you’re still you.” 

Julien shook his head, “I just… I know you think that, but I think we’re shaped by our experiences, alright? And I don’t remember anything.” 

“If we were shaped by our experiences, I don’t think most of us would be here, sweetie.” Jehan said, frowning. “The city, for all its faults, was never really _bad_ to most of you guys. Enjolras had a cushy life, Feuilly had a steady job he liked. Your ideals can shape you just as much as your experience.” 

“Huh.” Julien said, he’d never thought about it that way. 

“I’m not saying that I expect you to have a huge speech or anything. It’s just… the people miss you, and they miss Paris. They just want to know that you’re alright.” Jehan said with a sigh. “Think about it, alright?”

… 

While Julien tried to think of something to say on the radio and talked to the Amis, trying to learn as much as he could about Tomorrow Comes and the rebellion, Paris was wrapped in his own attempts to connect with his former self. Bossuet and Gavroche had found him some paints at Thenardiers’ and they insisted that he try to paint something. 

“You should paint me.” Cosette said jokingly, when she noticed him struggling to find an idea, “I’m the best person you could paint.” 

“Yeah, alright.” Paris said. He had her sit in front of a window and started to sketch her out. His eyes glossed over, this all looked so familiar. When he came back to himself, the sketch was done, but it was not Cosette standing in front of the window overlooking the wastelands. It was a girl he’d never seen before, in front of a window covered in bars. Cosette got up and looked over his shoulder. 

“Sorry,” He began, but she just put her hand on his shoulder. 

“No, it’s perfect. You should paint it.” She said, her voice sounding a little choked up. Paris looked at her strangely, but she didn’t explain. “I can’t wait to see it.” 

Paris mentally shrugged and began to paint. Hours passed, but he was too wrapped up to care. Finally, finally he got it right. He took a step back. 

There was a woman, a teenager, with a fuzz of hair on her head, grinning in a sly way, like she was up to something. She was wearing the facility’s uniform, but it was ripped on the sides, like she wanted to be stylish in front of incarcerated criminals. The window behind her was barred with white bars, but there were trees with pink flowers. It must have been whatever passed for springtime there.

Paris frowned, who was she? He went to find Cosette, maybe she’d have answers. She wanted to see it anyways. He found her with Marius and Gavroche (Gavroche had been grounded for agreeing to go on Combeferre’s stupid mission, and he was supposed to be learning stuff from the couple, but he seemed to just be playing a video game on one of the laptops).

“I finished the painting, if you wanted to see it.” Paris said, “I uh, I have no idea what it’s of.”

The three followed him to the room and looked at the painting. All three got a pained expression on their face, but Cosette and Marius smiled. 

“It’s really good.” Cosette offered. 

“It’s Eponine.” Gavroche said, looking up at Paris, “You never draw her. I’ve… I’ve looked through your sketchbooks and you never did.”

Paris had no response for that. “Eponine was your sister, right?”

Gavroche let out a watery, almost angry laugh. “Yeah. Yeah and you were one of her best friends.”

“That’s the view from the west side of the facility.” Marius added. “That’s where all the important criminals were held.” 

“Glad to know they appreciated me.” Paris said, and Gavroche snorted. They looked at the painting for a while. 

“Hey, if… if I tell you some things to add, could you make me a little picture of her?” Gavroche asked, “We don’t have any photos of her without her mask for like four years before she died and… all you’d really need to change are the clothes and hair…”

“Yeah.” Paris said, “Yeah of course.” 

Gavroche beamed. 

…

Another few days passed, and it was well past midnight when Combeferre warily walked into the garage, where Courfeyrac was up late, fixing something. 

“Hey.” Combeferre said softly, holding a notebook in his hands. He cleared his throat when Courfeyrac didn’t turn around. “I uh… I found something that I think can fix this…” Combeferre stood in awkward silence for a moment, “I’m sorry, Courfeyrac.”

Courfeyrac wiped the grease off his hands, standing up and not looking at Combeferre. “What you did was insanely stupid and dangerous. And irresponsible. How are we supposed to trust you as our stand in leader if you can’t gather the common sense to not give a gun to child? Or to not take someone somewhere they literally still have nightmares about?” 

“It wasn’t right. I’m sorry.” Combeferre said, looking down at his notebook and swallowing hard. Coming here had been a bad idea. 

“You need to think things through, Ferre.” Courfeyrac said, looking up at him for the first time. He didn’t look as angry as Combeferre had expected, he just looked tired, “I miss him too, but traumatizing him won’t help.” 

“I know.” Combeferre said. “I think I found something that can actually fix it though.”

“What is it?” Courfeyrac asked, looking at the notebook Combeferre was holding. He’d only taken a few basic chemistry courses, so he only had a limited knowledge of what was going on. “What do we need?” 

“I put in a request with Thenardier a couple days ago, so the supplies should be here soon.” Combeferre started, “These are my notes from when I worked with Cubac, I didn’t realize at the time, but I helped him a lot with the memory erasure drug. I figure that even if he’s dead, they’re still using the same drug. It might be altered a little, but it seems to be working the same way on Grantaire at least.” 

Courfeyrac nodded, “Well, if you need any help, you can always ask me.” 

Combeferre was a little surprised. Courfeyrac had never offered to help in his lab, though he was very capable, as one of the three with the highest level of education. 

“Thanks, Courf.” He said sincerely, “I appreciate it.” 

…

Combeferre had the cure in a record three days. He tested it, briefly, on some rats, but he was sure it would work. It had to work. 

He called everyone he needed into the medical ward. He figured it would be safer if they were surrounded by soft-ish beds rather than chemicals in his lab. The rats had seemed to be fine, taking the injection and going about their lives. Maybe this would be easy, quick.

Once everyone necessary was there, Combeferre started to get the supplies ready. 

“Alright Grantaire,” He said, even though he knew the man preferred to be called Paris. He filled the syringe. “This might take a minute to kick in.” 

Paris nodded, exchanging a glance with Julien. Julien did not look well. Combeferre pressed on, injecting both of them.

Minutes passed and nothing happened. Maybe the rats had been fine because nothing happened. Suddenly, Paris looked around the room he looked at everyone, like everything was amazing. His gaze whipped around wildly, like he was trying to take in everything. 

He looked at Julien, who was still standing normally, and his face turned to a look of horror and awe, as if the man before him was a supernova, bursting to life. Julien backed away, confused. He started shaking his head, falling to the ground next to Paris, his eyes transfixed. Paris fell soon after, without Julien’s hand to keep him steady. 

Joly rushed to help Paris while Combeferre tried to wrestle Julien back into a semi-standing position so he could get him into one of the cots. Joly was asking Paris questions, trying to see how lucid the man was, to no avail. Julien was still thrashing in his arms. 

They finally got the two of them into beds, strapped down so they wouldn’t fall out. They were mumbling things that didn’t make sense. Grantaire was asking for Eponine, Bossuet, Joly, Enjolras. His eyes were closed and his voice was weak. Enjolras was just repeating “no”.

…

Enjolras awoke the next morning. He struggled to get into a sitting position, gasping. There was something holding him down.

“Julien, you’re awake!” said a cheerful, familiar voice. Enjolras turned to see Courfeyrac. He furrowed his brow. 

“Julien?” He asked, confused. “Why are you… oh.” He remembered. He looked down at himself. “Why am I wearing a sweater? That says ‘Tomorrow Comes’?”

“You refused to wear anything else.” Courfeyrac replied. “Don’t you remember?” 

Enjolras strained his memory. He could remember, but it was weird, remembering what he’d been like. He buried his face in his hands. 

“Oh my god.” He said, his voice muffled. “I was so stupid. And embarrassing. Just… why.” 

“Oh, you’re always embarrassing.” Courfeyrac commented. Through his fingers, Enjolras could see that he was smiling so wide that it was a wonder his face didn’t split in half. “Nothing new.” 

“Ha ha.” Enjolras said sarcastically. He took his hands away from his face and noticed a glint of metal. He struggled against the restraints again, “Grantaire, where’s Grantaire?”

“Woah, slow down. I’ll let you out, but you have to chill.” Courfeyrac said, unbuckling him. He pulled back the curtain that separated the room. “He’s right here.”

Grantaire was asleep. He was restrained the same way Enjolras had been, which was a little reassuring. At least Enjolras hadn’t been the only one. He got up on shaky feet and sat on the bed, holding Grantaire’s hand.

“What happened?” Courfeyrac asked. “Like, how did this all happen?” 

“We uh… we got captured.” Enjolras said, trying to remember. “And we were separated. But then… then they let us be in the same room and it was worse, Courf. I… I couldn’t deal with them doing what they were doing to him. But I couldn’t give you guys up, it… there were no options.” 

Courfeyrac sat next to him and put his arm around Enjolras’s shoulders, “But how did you guys end up as citizens? With Feuilly, no less.”

“The nurse, Manon, she gave me a deal. It was for her memory experiments, she wanted to see how her new, improved memory wipe would work.” Enjolras said, frowning at the memory of the woman. “I agreed.” 

“Oh.” Courfeyrac said, “That’s terrible.” 

“Yeah.” Enjolras said. He looked over to his friend. He didn’t want to burden him with all of this heavy stuff, he wanted to give him something happy. Some levity to this situation. “There was one good thing, though.” 

“Yeah?” Courfeyrac asked, looking hopeful. 

“You’re looking at the first officially married gay people in all of New Paris.” Enjolras said, plastering a grin on his face, “Javert gave us legal rights.”

Courfeyrac laughed in disbelief, “Really?” 

“Yep.” Enjolras said, laughing a little, “They gave Grantaire my name too.”

“So that’s how that happened. We were wondering.” 

“And we found Feuilly.” Enjolras added, “Oh my god, Feuilly’s not dead. What the hell?” 

“Yeah, that’s what we were saying!” Courfeyrac laughed, “You found him!” 

“How?” Enjolras asked, “Wait… I think he was trying to hook me and Grantaire up in the city… We could have had him sent to the facility, what was he thinking?” 

Courfeyrac seemed to want to respond, but he was laughing too hard. When he could breathe again, he wiped his eyes, calming down. 

“I should get the others.” Courfeyrac said, “They missed you.”

“Hey, can you grab me something that’s… not this?” Enjolras asked, gesturing to his sweater. He realized that he could actually take it off, he was no longer restricted by the social norms of the city, and he ripped off the sweater.

“What do you want me to do with it?” Courfeyrac asked, picking up the offending, fuzzy lump of fabric.

“Burn it.” Enjolras said. Courfeyrac left the room laughing.

…

Courfeyrac returned with all of the Amis and a red shirt. Enjolras took it gratefully, and looked around at his friends. Plus Montparnasse for some reason. Enjolras’s gaze lingered on Combeferre. He was mad at him, somewhere in his mind, but he couldn’t quite remember why? None of his memories seemed to be in sequential order. 

“Why’s Montparnasse here?” Enjolras asked.

“Julien, don’t you remember our fun hair braiding sessions?” Montparnasse asked. Enjolras frowned. He did, actually kind of remember that.

He looked to his other friends for explanation. 

“We needed a lot of help from the Patron Minette to get you back.” Jehan said, “Montparnasse said he wanted to be here because he missed your talks.”

Before Enjolras could think of a witty comeback, Grantaire’s hand moved. Enjolras looked back at his husband, who was stirring awake. 

“Can you get the restraints off of him?” Enjolras asked Bossuet, who was the closest to the bed. After a little fumbling, all the restraints were off and Grantaire’s eyes fluttered open. 

“Apollo?” He asked, his voice raspy. Enjolras bent down and grabbed him in a tight hug. 

“R, I’m so glad you’re awake! Oh my god-” Enjolras said, but he was shoved away suddenly. He looked down at his husband questioningly, and got slapped, hard.

There was a collective gasp, Montparnasse giggled, and Jehan quietly whispered “ _oh shit_ ”.

“What?” Enjolras asked, holding his cheek, but Grantaire grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him back down in a hug. 

“Don’t you ever fucking do anything like that ever again.” Grantaire said, sounding angry and relieved all at once, “I thought it was over! I thought it was going to be worse than death.”

“We’re here though!” Enjolras said, laughing a little, “We’re back!”

“Yeah.” Grantaire said into Enjolras’s hair. “Yeah, we are.”

“And we’re really married.” Enjolras reminded him.

Grantaire laughed helplessly, “Yeah, we are.”

“And you called us terrorists.” Bahorel chimed in. 

“Oh man, we did, didn’t we?” Grantaire asked, laughing. “That’s fucking insane. We actually thought we might have been rebels, but we said it was too crazy.” 

“And Grantaire tried to shoot us!” Courfeyrac said cheerfully, “That was fun.” 

“Yeah, he’s a Gran-terrorist.” Bossuet said. Grantaire turned to grin at his friend. 

“Dude. I think I missed you the most. Just because of that. You’re my new favorite.” He said. 

This went on for a little bit, each of them recounting absurd things that happened and laughing about it. Eventually, people filtered out of the room until Combeferre was the only one left. 

By now, Enjolras remembered why he was mad. Combeferre had been strangely quiet too, so maybe he knew he fucked up.

“Hey, R, can you go back to the room for a minute? I want to talk to Ferre.” Enjolras said. 

Grantaire seemed to understand, he probably remembered too. He nodded and left. 

“Are you feeling any better?” Combeferre gave Enjolras a weak smile.

“Yeah.” Enjolras said, crossing his arms, “What the fuck happened at the hotel, Ferre?”

Combeferre glanced to the side, not ready to have this talk yet. “I’m sorry, I thought it would help. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

Enjolras sighed, “Yeah, none of us were really in our right mind.” He looked up at his friend, “Just… I thought I was getting over it, but I can hear them in my head again. Screaming.”

Combeferre looked at his friend, guilt playing across his features. Wordlessly he walked over to Enjolras, sitting beside him and wrapping him in a hug, “I’m sorry. I fucked up, I should have never done that. I knew I shouldn’t have and I did it anyways.” He held the blond tightly, protectively.

“I don’t think I really have right to be mad at you though, considering I kind of did the same thing to my husband.” Enjolras said, turning to bury his face in his friend’s chest, “Just don’t do it again.”


	12. We Don't Need Another Song About California

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“We’re going to plan an attack on the city.”_

Over the next few weeks, Enjolras and Grantaire slowly told their friends about what had happened in the city, both in the facility and as citizens, as they remembered. In return, the other Amis told them about their time working for Montparnasse, and how the people of the desert seemed to rally around once Enjolras and Grantaire were safely home. 

Enjolras wanted to use this newfound solidarity with the residents of the wastelands to get even with Tomorrow Comes, but he wasn’t sure how, yet. He’d been contemplating the subject for days and couldn’t think of anything. Tomorrow Comes remained indestructible. 

Jehan was sitting with him, retelling all the gossip he’d missed when he was gone. They were listening to music from a queue Enjolras had set up. There was a lull in Jehan’s story and they sat in companionable silence.

“You know, you were the talk of the wastelands back when you were captured, you know.” Jehan said after a moment, “They thought that speech you made on TV was going to be the last speech you ever made.” 

Enjolras thought about this. He’d heard about the fabled television broadcast, but he had yet to remember that. He hadn’t thought on it very hard though, trying to remember stuff from Manon’s office instead. In the silence that followed Jehan’s statement, Enjolras tried to remember, really tried. 

The memories came to him easily, far easier than he thought they would. Jehan faded from his view as he remembered the day of the broadcast. 

_Enjolras read lines off of white cue cards. He didn’t know why, he didn’t really understand the meaning of the words he was spouting out. He didn’t know the wastelands or the Patron Minette or Javert. He did know Tomorrow Comes and he did know that he owed them his life._

_“After all, the future is inevitable, so why try to stop it?” He asked, marking the end of his speech. One of the workers for the television station made a cut motion, signifying that he was clear to move. He looked at the Operative that was his escort._

_“The other prisoner is coming in.” The Operative told him, and ushered him out of the white room to the other side of a glass wall, where the production crew was working, supervised by more Operatives. Enjolras knew that he was supposed to be going back to his room, but they stopped in the production room for a moment._

_He watched as a man with dark curly hair walked into the room and was handed pails of paint and a brush. Enjolras was transfixed as the man began to paint, blocking out rough forms on the wall as if he was born to do it. He wished he knew something as well as that man seemed to know painting._

_He was brought back to reality when he realized that the Operative watching him was talking. He quickly found out that the Op wasn’t actually talking to him, but rather to the other Ops that were guarding the production crew._

_“I’m getting stationed up north.” Enjolras’s Op said, sounding as disgruntled as an Operative could in public. “The rebels are becoming a problem.”_

_“I thought we had a handle on that.” An Operative replied, gesturing at Enjolras. “I haven’t heard anything about them making a fuss about their leader.”_

_“No, not those rebels.” Enjolras’s Op said, sounding vaguely annoyed. “The ones in California. They’ve been moving further south. I heard they are running from the corporation in their area, it’s close to the ocean. They’re following the ocean south and the other corporation wanted everyone to know how dangerous they are.”_

_“Didn’t you see the wanted posters at the briefing?” Another Op asked. The Operative that was initially confused shrugged._

_“I was on duty during the last briefing.” He said._

_“Well, they’re predicted to be close to us, roaming the coast. They are rumored to have bombed a building in their city. They’re sending a unit of us up there to make sure they never make it down here.” Enjolras’s Operative, “After this guy is gone, I’m scheduled to leave.”_

_“Can’t say I’ll miss you.” One of the Ops said, “I don’t even remember your name.”_

_“Come on, Kevin.” Enjolras’s Operative complained, “I’ve worked with you for two years and you don’t know my name? I mean, I know we wear masks, but come on.”_

_The door slid open before anyone could mention the Operative’s actual name, letting Manon in. Enjolras had met Manon before and he disliked her immensely. Enjolras’s Op cut off his conversation and left the room, probably wishing to avoid the woman as much as Enjolras did._

“Enjolras?” Jehan asked, looking concerned, “You alright there? You spaced out.” 

“Jehan.” Enjolras said urgently, grabbing the hand that Jehan had been waving in front of his face, “Jehan, we have to go to California.” 

“Woah, are you flashbacking? We went there, Enj. It didn’t end well.” Jehan said, frowning. 

Enjolras fought off a shiver at the memory. No, he did not want a repeat of that situation, but they needed to go north. Now he knew where the rebels were, he needed to find them, to get them on his side. 

“No, we have to call a meeting, immediately.” Enjolras said, “I’ll explain, just… go find people.” 

Jehan sighed and let go of Enjolras’s hand, walking off to find their friends. Enjolras took a moment to compose himself, to formulate half a plan, before running off to help usher everyone into the living room. 

One everyone was gathered, Enjolras stood before them with fire in his eyes that they thought was missing. Whatever this mission was, they were equal parts excited and terrified. 

“We’re going to plan an attack on the city.” Enjolras said, without preface. He watched as his friends’ expressions turned to horror. 

“You can’t be serious.” Feuilly said, “We just got back here!” 

“I’m dead serious.” Enjolras replied. “We can do this, we need to send a message, to tell them that they can not fuck with us without repercussion.” 

“How do you think we’re going to attack the city?” Musichetta asked, “There are more Ops there than ever! Are we just going to arm citizens and unleash them without training?” 

“No, no.” Enjolras said, grinning, “We’re going to get the rebels from California.” 

“Noo…” Courfeyrac moaned, “Enj, you can’t do this!” 

“We tried, Enj. We couldn’t find them.” Bahorel added. 

“We did try,” Enjolras conceded, “But we weren’t operating on correct information.” 

“And now you magically got new info?” Grantaire asked, crossing his arms.

“I remembered.” Enjolras said, shooting a glance at Grantaire. The man was supposed to be on his side, they were married for god’s sake. “I remembered giving the speech on TV and I overheard a conversation. The California rebels are south now, they’re by the ocean. Our timing was off, but now we have an option to actually get into contact with them.” 

“How do we know they’ll be willing to work with us?” Combeferre asked. “What if we find them for nothing?” 

“They hate the corporations as much as we do.” Enjolras said, “They bombed a building in their city, I’m sure they’d be willing to help us out.” He sighed, looking around beseechingly, “We have to try. This is the only opportunity we’ve had in a long time. If we don’t take it, we’re just submitting to them.” 

“There’s no fucking way,” Musichetta chimed in, “That we’re all going up there. No way.” 

“No.” Enjolras agreed, “I’ll only need a few people to go with me. The rest of you will be recruiting capable residents and collecting weapons and intel.” 

“Who were you thinking of taking with you?” Combeferre asked, looking a little more open to the idea. 

“I wanted to bring Courfeyrac and Feuilly.” Enjolras said. Grantaire caught his eye, a murderous expression on his face at the implication of being left behind, “And of course Grantaire.” 

“So you’re just going to leave us behind again to figure out what to do?” Bahorel asked, crossing his arms. 

“No, I have a specific plan. We’ll keep in contact via two-way radio the whole time, no one is leaving anyone behind.” Enjolras assured him, “We’re going to need to get some supplies together and…” Enjolras sighed, “We’re going to have to call Montparnasse.” 

…

Enjolras divided up the labor. Some Amis were going to be looking for supplies, some were going to be recruiting. Combeferre was going to whip up another batch of the resistance drug he’d made the last time they stormed the city. Marius was looking up some specific locations and names Enjolras had given him. 

The conversation with Montparnasse had been nothing short of painful. Enjolras had to agree to two favors (within reason) for Montparnasse to agree to help with the raid. It was a little easier than he’d expected, he suspected that Montparnasse wanted to fuck up the city as much as they did. 

Montparnasse even offered to contact Javert, to tell him to get his favorite guards off duty that night. Javert… Enjolras was confused what to think of the man. He told Montparnasse to hold off until an hour before the raid. 

Once everything was set into motion, Enjolras, Courfeyrac, Feuilly, and Grantaire headed up north, ready for whatever California had to offer them.


	13. Zero Percent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The end.

It took two months, but all of Enjolras’s plans fell into place. He’d found the rebels and with Feuilly’s help he’d convinced them to join their cause. Back at home, the other Amis had done what they were supposed to do, recruiting and collecting and gathering information. Finally, it was time to set their plan into motion. 

Enjolras and Grantaire were the ones who were going to be carrying out the main mission. The others-including the Patron Minette, the California rebels and the 150 citizens and non legal citizens they’d recruited from the wastelands-were going to be creating a distraction. 

That distraction was going to be the biggest riot in New Paris history. 

Combeferre had made enough of the airborne resistance drug that it was sure to set off everyone in the surrounding area. Their main goal was to attract as many Operatives to their area and then release the drug, killing as many Ops as they could and distracting as many as they could aside from that. 

Marius and Courfeyrac had gone into the city an hour before everyone else, to set up a transmitter and camera to broadcast what Enjolras and Grantaire were about to do. They called Javert to warn him about the attack and he said he was going to send all of the “good” Ops home. Enjolras was unsure whether to believe the man or not, but it seemed to appease Grantaire, who thought of him as a changed man. 

Enjolras and Grantaire stood outside of the city walls. The Amis had just stormed through on the other side, leading an army of colorfully dressed rebels to fuck shit up. Enjolras glanced at Grantaire. They were in city clothes again, to be sure that they wouldn’t get stopped in all the confusion. 

“You ready?” Grantaire asked. Enjolras nodded. They walked through the wall. 

The city was silent. It was never really _loud_ , but this was unnerving. Everyone seemed to have gone inside, safely away from the chaos going on on the other side of New Paris. They walked through the empty streets quickly. They knew that they didn’t have much time and they needed to make the most of it. 

They got to their destination, a little house in North Sector A. Manon’s house. They walked in, Marius and Courfeyrac had left the door unlocked, and quickly dug clothes out of their bag. They needed to look like rebels for their big televised comeback. 

Time passed. Grantaire got more nervous as the minutes ticked by. 

“She should be here.” He said, looking nervously at the door. “What if this is a trap? What if she knows what we’re doing?” 

“She doesn’t.” Enjolras said with more confidence than he felt. “She’ll be here. She was probably just getting something done in the facility.” 

“I hope so.” Grantaire said. “I think I’m going to wait outside and watch for Ops.” 

“No! You’ll blow our cover!” Enjolras said, grabbing his arm to stop him from leaving, “We have to stay here.” 

They waited in silence for a few more agonizing minutes. 

Finally, the door opened. Manon was alone. She looked up in surprise when she felt the cold metal of Enjolras’s gun against her neck. 

“W-what?” She asked. She sounded helpless, like she had in the facility the first time they’d met, when she was Cubac’s nurse. Enjolras knew better now. 

“Manon.” He said, grabbing her arm and leading her to a chair, his gun still at her neck, “How nice of you to join us.” 

“Julien?” She asked, looking at him, then looking over to Grantaire, “Paris? Oh good, you’ve come back!” 

Grantaire tied Manon into the chair Enjolras had set her in. She wriggled against the restraint to no avail. 

“Not for long.” Grantaire said, “We’ve just got to tie up some loose ends.” 

“Well, you’ll be here for some time, I’m afraid.” She said, smirking. “Guards!” 

A voice activated alarm went off, flashing red lights through the house. There was no sound. Manon looked concerned as the silence stretched on and the smirk fell from her face. Marius must have taken care of the alarm while he was there. 

“Nice party lights.” Grantaire commented. “But we’ll still be killing you.” 

“No…” She said, widening her eyes. “No, please! Julien, Paris, you can’t kill me! I only did all those things because I cared.”

“Shut up.” Enjolras snarled, “We’re not falling for that. Not again.” He looked over to Grantaire, “R, turn on the cameras.” 

“No! No, please-” Manon began to beg, but Enjolras tied a gag around her mouth, muffling her protests. Grantaire turned on the camera. 

“Citizens of New Paris,” Enjolras said, looking into the camera, “This is the head doctor of the facility. Her name is Manon and she tortured R and I for over a month. She has done this to every citizen that made it into her grasp, she may have tortured your family, she may have tortured _you_. She wipes everyone’s mind when they leave, so no one knew, but we’re here to get revenge, for everyone who suffered at her hands. This is for all of you.” 

Enjolras handed the gun to Grantaire, who had been standing silently, just in view of the camera. 

“Me? No, you deserve this.” Grantaire said, pushing the gun back into his husband’s hand. Enjolras nodded and turned on Manon. 

She shook her head and shrieked through the restraints and the gag. Enjolras found it hard to believe that someone so pitiful had caused them so much pain. He shot once and she stopped moving.

Blood dripped down to make a pool on the floor around her. Grantaire turned off the camera. 

Sirens started. Obviously someone realized that the riots had been a distraction for the main event. They abandoned their supplies-they could always find new cameras-and ran outside. Ops were coming from all sides. 

“We need to split up.” Enjolras said, “You go west, I’ll go east. Meet at the bus station.” 

Grantaire nodded and they ran through the alleys they’d known from their childhood, They easily escaped the Operatives, meeting up again quickly. 

“Time for phase two of the plan?” Grantaire asked, grinning. He didn’t notice the Operative sneaking up behind him, having followed him for some time, but Enjolras did. He shot the man just as he raised his gun to shoot Grantaire. 

“Yeah.” Enjolras said in reply as Grantaire whirled around to see what exactly Enjolras had shot. “But we’ve got to be fast.”

Grantaire turned back and nodded, slipping a backpack from his shoulders. He pulled out black and red spray paint cans, uncapping them and quickly going to work on the wall. 

Everyone was going to see it. Thousands, maybe millions of people came through this station every day. Everyone needed to get somewhere, only the privileged few had cars.

Five minutes passed. Grantaire painted frantically. Enjolras was on edge, he felt like sitting here was just inviting an attack. It had been his idea, of course, but that didn’t put his mind at ease at all. In the back of his mind, it reminded Enjolras of being a kid, a teenager in the city watching R paint. A wave of nostalgia crashed over him, and he smiled at his husband’s back. 

Finally, Grantaire backed up to show off the image. It was an image of the facility, a very distinct building, burning. Underneath it, he’s written _”The future is inevitable”_. 

Enjolras marveled at it for what turned out to be a second too long. There was a noise, and when they turned around, Enjolras and Grantaire saw at least thirty Ops closing in on them. 

Enjolras cursed. They should have run when they had the chance. He glanced at Grantaire, who dropped the paint cans and drew his gun. 

“Well.” Grantaire said regretfully, “We had a good run. I guess this is the end. They’re going to kill us for sure.” 

Enjolras turned the safety off on his gun and scoffed, taking aim at the closest Op. “They can try.”

…

Enjolras and Grantaire had taken down about ten Operatives when they heard an annoying, musical honk. The Ops looked around in confusion and they couple used that distraction as an opportunity to shoot them. A car made a sharp turn around the corner. It was Jehan in Baby 2.0. 

“Get the fuck in!” The ginger yelled, screeching to a halt. He shot an Op in the head, trying to provide covering fire as best as he could. 

“Kevin!” One of the other Operatives yelled as Enjolras and Grantaire rushed by. Enjolras felt a pang of regret. These were people, they were just doing their jobs. He shook himself. No, those jobs were killing his friends. And he would have no mercy on anyone who wanted to hurt them. 

Grantaire wrenched open the door and they jumped in the car as Jehan started driving again. They ducked as an Op shot out their window. 

“Oh Jesus, Courf is going to kill me if I break his car,” Jehan whined, “You guys need to be more careful.” 

“We’ll be more careful next time we storm the city, Jehan. Promise.” Grantaire said. Jehan shot him a look in the rearview mirror. 

“We are never doing this again. You hear me, ladies? Never.” He said. He turned his eyes back to the road, narrowly avoiding colliding with a fire hydrant. “We have to get back to the fight. That’s the only part of the wall that’s big enough to fit this car through.”

“Got it.” Enjolras said, and he and Grantaire looked out the window as Jehan drove through streets filled with clashing fighters, the white of the Operatives’ suits versus the color that embodied the rebels, the desert. Jehan swerved wildly to avoid running over their friends. 

It seemed that there wasn’t much of a fight. The Operatives looked too confused, shooting wildly and inaccurately as Combeferre’s drug took effect. Enjolras grinned as he watched Bahorel knock out an Op with one punch, seeming to have forgotten his gun. Grantaire found Joly in the crowd as they passed, patching up any wounded rebels. 

“Hey, stop the car.” Enjolras said to Jehan when they were almost at the exit. Jehan did so, and Enjolras rolled down his window, standing so his torso was poking out of the car. 

“Fall back!” He yelled, “Mission complete!” 

A cheer rose up around them and they started to drive once more. The army of rebels streamed out of the city with them, some helping wounded friends. Jehan stopped long enough to let Courfeyrac into the car, and they continued out into the desert, back home. 

They hadn’t won this yet, not by a long shot. Maybe they never would. But this, this act of rebellion, these displays, that would certainly set _something_ into motion. Grantaire laced his fingers through Enjolras’s as they watched their temporary army disperse into the desert. He grinned. It didn’t matter if they never got to see the fall of Tomorrow Comes, it didn’t matter if they never got to liberate New Paris. They were going to fight until the day they died, and there was nothing, _nothing_ anyone could do to stop that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god you guys!!! It is over at last. We apologize so much for the wonky updates, these have been a pretty busy past couple of months, but thank you to everyone who has read this all the way through <3 We appreciate your comments dearly and don't forget to check out the art!

**Author's Note:**

> Check out this art!  
> [Feuilly](http://spinalbaby.tumblr.com/post/146047225644/novartss-feuilly-thats-all-that-needs-to-be) by Novartss  
> [Oh my god](http://spinalbaby.tumblr.com/post/148154370799/a-few-previously-unposted-sketches-from) by Spinalbaby  
> [Them](http://spinalbaby.tumblr.com/post/145486546709/a-sketch-from-conventional-weapons-the-sequel-to) by Spinalbaby  
> 


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